[!WARNING] 翻译质量评估未完全通过 (Quality Audit Failed) 发现以下潜在质量问题: - missing numeric tokens from source: 1071, 16977, 16978, 16979, 1887, 250000, 27.07.26, 3364 - Missing proper nouns in translation: Abdul
Ballout, Aberdeen Aberporth Anglesey Aviemore Barnstaple Bedford Belfast Birmingham Bournemouth Bridlington Bristol Camborne Cardiff Edinburgh Eskdalemuir Glasgow Hereford Herstmonceux Ipswich Isle, Aberdeen Belfast Birmingham Cardiff Exeter Glasgow Liverpool London Manchester Newcastle Norwich Penzance Sheffield, Abraham Darby Comprehensive School, Abu Dhabi, Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, Aegean
October, After Barnet, After Mary Hartman, After Perry
- source dates, money, or percentage tokens may be missing
Geraldine Scott 助理政治编辑 青少年的焦虑比工作更赚钱
Geraldine Scott 助理政治编辑 国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 表示,由于电缆瓶颈,必须关闭偏远地区的涡轮机,而燃气发电厂将取而代之。 Neso 为管理电力系统而产生的成本通过家庭和企业的能源账单回收。如果预测的增长成真,平均每年每户家庭的账单可能会增加约 £10。
Emily Gosden 能源编辑
由于输电网络容量不足,支付给风电场和其他发电厂以要求其关闭而给消费者带来的成本,预计在未来一年将增加 £1 billion,达到 £3.2 billion。 大部分成本源于支付
一名消防员在吉伦特省的阿雷斯(Arès)与火焰搏斗,该地区受山火影响最严重。当局已制定应急计划以疏散波尔多
Daisy Eastlake 政治记者
因焦虑而领取病假津贴的青少年每周比从事最低工资兼职工作的人多领取 £100。 超过 87,000 16 和 17 岁的青年正在领取个人独立付款 (Pip),这是一种非资产调查性津贴,旨在涵盖残疾带来的额外费用。 在领取最高档次(每周 £194)的人群中,超过三分之二是因为心理健康和神经发育状况而申请的,包括焦虑、抑郁、自闭症和 ADHD。 一名每周工作 12 小时的 16 岁青少年(学期内的法定最高时长)
39 岁时我参加了一次 阿尔茨海默病测试
时间,在 18 岁以下最低工资下 到手约为 £94.。同一名因焦虑而被判定无法工作的青少年,在居家期间领取的金额可能是该时薪等值的两倍多。 无论是否在接受全日制教育或拥有工作,个人均可申请 个人独立付款 (残障津贴) (Pip)。申请资格基于身体或精神状况如何影响其完成日常任务及出行的能力。 本周,安迪·伯纳姆 将就 尼特族 (非在学、非在职、非在训青年) (Neets) 问题进行干预。据了解,他认为推动进一步教育对于降低年轻尼特族人数至关重要,尽管 84% 的
Monday July 27 2026 | thetimes.com | No 75095
在部长们寻求履行降低能源成本承诺的同时,这给价格带来了进一步压力。 国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 表示,天然气价格上涨是预测的所谓 “限制成本 (电网调度成本)” (constraint costs) 增加的主要原因,因为这将提高运行替代天然气电厂的成本。 由于网络公司正采取
他们表示希望工作。他还将就社会护理改革发表演讲。唐宁街一名消息人士表示,首相将在本周“探讨尝试解决一些政治家长期以来一直回避的极其困难的问题”。 在唐宁街的首次演讲中,伯纳姆表示,政府将“通过改变教育系统并为他们提供更多支持,帮助更多年轻人就业”,以及建设更多的市政住房。 在上个月的一次演讲中,他谈到无法找到稳定工作的年轻人时说:“不要责怪他们,责怪我们自己。我们一直没有给人们这种稳定性——这种在生活中进步的能力,现在是我们该这么做的时候了。”
暂时将部分输电线路停用以进行升级。该公司表示,这应有助于从长远上解决问题,但短期内将加剧瓶颈。 国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 必须确保整个网络的供需时刻保持平衡,以便有足够的电力从发电厂传输到消费者手中而不会导致电线过载。
保守党领袖 凯米·巴德诺克 表示,她愿意与伯纳姆在社会护理的跨党派计划上开展合作,但前提是他必须承诺不通过增税来为改革买单。她说:“你必须排除任何最终将由下一代偿还的增税或增加借款的可能性。” 一名来自 No 10 消息人士表示,伯纳姆已承诺将恪守 工党 的竞选宣言,不提高所得税、国民保险或增值税。 影子工作与养老金大臣 海伦·沃特利 表示,“激励机制完全颠倒了”,这在将年轻人推向依赖福利的生活。 她说:“我们的病假津贴制度崩溃了。它本应为严重残障人士服务,结果数以千计的青少——
£3.20 £2.35 订阅者价
与家庭裂痕的 ‘代价’ Shane Watson
近年来,由于风电场在电网升级到能够可靠地将所有电量传输给消费者之前就被允许接入网络,限制成本 (电网调度成本) 激增。 在举报人指称 6 月 23 日 发生长时间频率下降后,国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 在安全管理英国电力供应的能力方面受到了审查。
财相致力于投入我们在国防方面所需的资金,否则我不会接受这个职位。”
安迪·伯纳姆昨天表示:“我们共同面临的首要挑战是确保国防投资计划获得全额资金,这是摆在目前最重要的事情,我们需要在今年晚些时候预算案出台前解决这个问题。”
伯纳姆表示,英国对乌克兰的支持“依然坚定不移”。他将于今日迎接泽连斯基总统到访,这是他就任首相后的首位国际访客。他们将参观一座海军基地,伯纳姆将在那里宣布,英国将移交其新型“石披风” (电子战系统) 背后的知识产权,使乌克兰能够大规模生产该技术。
斯特雷廷表示,历史将会感谢唐纳德·特朗普总统,后者一直要求欧洲盟友增加国防开支。他告诉天空新闻(Sky News):“我们并不总是喜欢他所说的话。我们并不总是喜欢他的手段。但我真诚地认为,当这段历史被记录下来时,欧洲
组织,包括今年 3 月对四辆哈措拉 (以色列救护车服务) 救护车的纵火袭击。
该动议由伦敦大学伯贝克学院政治经济学读者的阿肖克·库马尔提出。2023 年 10 月 7 日,他在 X 上发布了 Nova 音乐节的照片,当时有 378 名以色列人被杀,他写道:“有时在被窃取的土地上、在百万人口被饿死的集中营旁边开派对,后果会很严重。”
库马尔表示,他坚持自己的动议“以及巴勒斯坦人民根据国际法反抗占领的权利,因为绿党应该由原则引导,而不是充当美国帝国的附庸,或者在巴勒斯坦人被杀害时袖手旁观”。
工党议员大卫·泰勒表示,即使是考虑讨论该动议也“绝对令人不齿”。他说:“扎克·波兰斯基必须意识到伊朗构成的威胁,并确保该动议及其提出者立即被逐出绿党。”
会议动议的优先级由成员投票决定。
绿党表示:“距离会议召开还有数月之久,尽管成员们已开始提交动议,但并非所有提交的内容最终都会被讨论。”
这位新任国防大臣在接受《泰晤士》广播电台采访时被问及,履行支出承诺是否像他的前任——现任财相约翰·希利那样,对他而言是一个涉及辞职的问题。
斯特雷廷表示:“是的。对我来说,这绝对是一个原则问题。”
国防投资计划在推迟一年后于 6 月 30 日公布,承诺追加 150 亿英镑 (£15 billion) 的支出。然而,财政部仅确认了其中的 103 亿英镑 (£10.3 billion),这意味着还剩 47 亿英镑 (£4.7 billion) —— 其中包括下一财年所需的 18 亿英镑 (£1.8 billion) —— 需要在秋季预算中筹措。
在基尔·斯塔默爵士领导下的唐宁街提供了 130 亿英镑 (£13 billion),而国防部要求的则是 180 亿英镑 (£18 billion)。希利因不接受该结算而辞职。
斯特雷廷告诉《泰晤士》广播电台:“如果我不相信这位首相和这位
就是否应取消对伊朗的制裁,以及在政府采取行动禁止支持该组织后,是否应免除对伊朗革命卫队的禁令进行辩论。 该动议在政党的秋季会议前提交,要求政府与德黑然追求“外交正常化”,并承诺绿党将为取消经济制裁而开展活动。 动议称,该党将反对“对伊朗国家机构(包括伊斯兰革命卫队 (IRGC))的禁令或定名”,因为此类措施“适得其反,破坏外交,关闭了接触渠道,并减少了调解和和平建设的机会”。 动议中未提及伊朗革命卫队在英国的活动。自 2022 年以来,军情五局 (MI5) 已瓦解了多起由伊朗支持的在英国领土上绑架或杀害人员的阴谋;7 月 13 日,政府根据新的《国家安全法》权力禁止支持伊朗革命卫队。该禁令是在英国发生了七起与该组织相关的袭击之后出台的。
风电场关停成本
能源顾问本·瓦茨 (Ben Watts) 的分析显示,在当天,苏格兰沿海的风电场必须被支付费用以停止发电,南部几家电厂因维护而停机,且通往欧洲的海底电缆正在将电力从英格兰南部导出。 《泰晤士报》获得的国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 内部报告显示,在五条线路上出现了约束被突破的情况,在危机期间,电缆传输的电力超过了应有水平。 此外,部长们收到建议,不应坚持从 2034 年起关停数字地面电视,因为它是唯一能够在长期断电期间继续广播的通信网络。 国家备灾委
周六《泰晤士报》首页关于国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 报告的报道
委员会主席哈林盖的哈里斯勋爵 (Lord Harris of Haringey) 表示:“政府面临的问题远不止人们未来如何观看电视,而是在基于互联网的系统失效时,国家将如何进行通信。”
国防大臣确认,他周五与美国战争部长皮特·海格塞斯 (Pete Hegseth) 进行了交谈,并预计在几天内再次交谈。他告诉天空新闻 (Sky News):“我明确表示,我们不支持在伊朗采取进攻行动,且不会支持在伊朗采取进攻行动,但在确保霍尔姆兹海峡安全、确保伊朗不研发核武器以及投资我们的能力和北约能力方面,有许多我们可以且应该共同做的事情。” 一名接近斯特里廷 (Streeting) 的人士表示:“韦斯 (Wes) 并没有威胁辞职。他只是说,为我们的国防提供适当资金是一个原则问题,如果首相没有明确他与财政大臣共同承担这一承诺,他将不会接任这一职位。”
青少年焦虑症补贴高于工资
残障事务大臣 Stephen Timms 爵士本月发布的一份中期审查报告发现,有证据表明,在某些情况下,残障津贴通过为申请人提供“另一种收入来源”而“降低了”就业积极性。
通用信用体系的架构师之一 Deven Ghelani 表示,Pip 的评估设计之初并非为了应对目前导致申请量激增的情况。他表示:“这变成了一项勾选清单的例行公事,而不是最初预想的基于行为、心理或社交的干预。”
据悉,政府部长们正在制定津贴制度的改革方案,并研究了荷兰、丹麦、德国和澳大利亚的支付机制,这些国家在引导年轻人重返职场方面更为成功。
政府表示:“Timms 审查中期报告明确指出,2013 年设计的 Pip 已不再适用,将于今年秋季提交的最终建议将为改革奠定基础。”
政府表示:“长期向 IPTV [互联网协议电视,使用互联网连接而非标准电缆或卫星] 过渡具有强有力的理由,但尚未做出决定。我们理解在国家紧急状态下信息获取的重要性……任何未来的过渡只有在确保相关安全保障措施……到位后才会进行。”
S1 3 News
哈里在梅根的电视客串中“乱入”
Channel 10
MasterChef Australia
萨塞克斯公爵夫人在录制该集节目期间,哈里通过视频电话介入,她称哈里是个“迷人者”。
昨天,梅根在这一烹饪系列赛的第 18 季中担任客座评委,参赛者被要求将一种主食原料转化为一道“符合公爵夫人身份”的菜肴。
这对夫妇在节目的评判环节中进行了交谈,当时哈里打了一个意外的电话。在制作人员将电话交给她后,她说:“嗨,亲爱的”,并将哈里介绍给参赛者和评委,并向他展示菜肴。
她说:“我丈夫在这儿。”该集是在梅根和哈里 4 月份为期一周的澳大利亚之旅期间拍摄的。
公爵夫人赞扬了参赛者 Aaron Kher 的菜肴,但开玩笑说对于哈里来说,这道菜的香料“太多了”。哈里用一句“g’day”问候了澳大利亚团队。
通话结束后,她说:“他真是个迷人者,不是吗?”
梅根在节目中表示:“我认为,家庭时光是透过食物建立联系的关键,所以只要能一起用餐,我们一定会尽量多在一起。”
她表示,哈里的英国成长背景意味着他更喜欢“肉类、土豆和奶油酱”,而出生于加州的公爵夫人则偏好烤肉、鱼类和柑橘类食品。
虽然她承认家人口味各异,但她表示他们的孩子仍然喜欢吃抱子甘蓝。
萨塞克斯夫妇之前的一份公告将新一季描述为包含一些“最令人印象深刻的...
[[IMG_XXXX]] 公爵夫人 将电话交给她
电视评论 查洛特·艾弗斯 (Charlotte Ivers)
(注:涉及数值 25, 10)
他们即将迎来一位“超出 [参赛者] 想象”的嘉宾。 现场布置满了鲜花和红色天鹅绒,我们被告知将迎来一位“全球偶像、慈善家、人道主义者,一位因其心肠、嗓音以及对家庭烹饪的深爱而闻名全球的女性”。于是,不出所料,身着黑色丝绸、在闪光灯和聚集的祝愿者的欢呼声中走在红地毯上的,正是萨塞克斯公爵夫人。 《澳大利亚顶级厨师》比其英国版本规模更大、风格更张扬。当一名厨师
公爵和公爵夫人的澳大利亚之行还包括会见心理健康慈善机构、无敌勇士(Invictus)退伍军人,以及邦迪
节目开始 15 分钟后(整整 90-minute (90 minutes!) 的节目!),才有人拿起汤匙。在这一段前奏中,我们得观看一场略显尴尬的站立采访……嗯,“我该称呼您为公爵夫人吗?”一位兴奋的主持人问道。“噢,叫我梅根就好,”我们的主角轻快地回答。这种互捧之情是相互的。 梅根是否喜欢《顶级厨师》,主持人兼前参赛者 Poh Ling Yeow 问道。在这次热情盛典的此时此刻,我愿意用我拥有的一切,只求“梅根殿下”能简单地说一声“不”。可惜没那么幸运。“噢我的天,当然喜欢!谁不是《顶级厨师》的粉丝?这是一个如此棒的节目。”同样获得好评的还有:澳大利亚(“我们太兴奋了,我们热爱澳大利亚”)、胡萝卜(“热爱胡萝卜”)以及“能够通过食物来滋养”。 我们被告知,公爵夫人的丈夫“因为来自英国,很喜欢吃肉、土豆和奶油酱”。但
Poh Ling Yeow。
当她宣布参与
梅根让我们在猜测根芹冰淇淋是否获胜时等待
柠檬、蜂蜜、草莓、根芹 以及苹果等。梅根希望参赛者能挑选一种“几乎感觉像传家宝一样”的食材,并围绕它制作一道菜。也许这种食材应该与“你家庭中的某些东西”或一段记忆相关。 对于四名参赛者中的两人来说,这种食材最终被选定为根芹。我们看到了根芹冰激凌,以及根芹配牛排。另一位男士则在用胡萝卜尝试一些东西。在经历了大量围绕根芹的琐碎折腾后,梅根被要求告知参赛者还剩 30 分钟。 她拒绝向整个房间大声喊出这个时间,而是走到每位参赛者的工作站前单独告知。参赛者卡斯珀 (Casper) 对这次互动的反应是:“当你跟她说话时,她会像在审视你的灵魂。”他正在制作章鱼配耶路撒冷朝鲜蓟泥。当梅根表示喜欢时,他的表情就像她刚刚向他求婚一样。 现在我们进入了认真的评审阶段。“我提到过我的丈夫
萨塞克斯在 本集节目中 与 索菲亚·莱文 (Sofia Levin) 共同出演。
她接到了 丈夫的 视频通话, 说着“嗨, 亲爱的”, 而制片人则给出了
戴安娜被埋葬在奥尔索普一个名为椭圆湖 (Oval Lake) 的偏僻小岛上,那是她家族近 13,000 英亩的庄园,目前由她的弟弟查尔斯·斯宾塞 (Charles Spencer) 拥有。该地不对公众开放。 梅根以热爱美食著称,她曾销售自己的果酱,并主持了一部 Netflix 生活方式系列剧《带着爱,梅根》(With Love, Meghan)。该剧在第二季之后被提名艾美奖生活方式类奖项。
这感觉是那种风格中最优雅、最高级的升级版。H 会很喜欢这道菜的,”梅根告诉那位“根芹配牛排”先生。难道这个世界上还没有一个厨师梦想过听到哈里·温莎 (Harry Windsor) 会喜欢他的牛排吗?胡萝卜先生接下来登场,但这个人是谁?一名制片人匆忙出现在屏幕上:“抱歉打扰。我们接到一个打到演播室的电话。” 紧接着,该男子那张红润的脸在视频通话中弹出:“怎么回事?我打断什么了吗?” “太神奇了。他们非常有才华。我们希望你也能在这儿,”公爵夫人悦耳地说道。“他现在在堪培拉。和退伍军人们在一起,”为了让我们知道,她补充道。 到最后,我对谁将被淘汰感到困惑,因为她喜爱每一道菜。 事实上,我们在本集中并不知道谁将离开。我们必须再等一天,那时参赛者还将收到亲人的信件,就像他们是战壕里的士兵,而不是在煮胡萝卜的男人。 我们怎么能抵挡住观看的诱惑呢? 夏洛特·伊弗斯 (Charlotte Ivers) 是《周日泰晤士报》的电视评论员
“我们在黑色的灰烬飘落时游泳,”
波尔多
戴维斯一家在拉卡诺湖 (Lake Lacanau) 的对岸目睹了勒波日 (Le Porge) 村庄被大火吞噬,他们当时就在两英里外的一处营地露营。“太阳变成了深红色,” 56 岁的亚当·戴维斯 (Adam Davis) 说道,他是沃金厄姆 (Wokingham) 议会的儿童服务主管。“那太可怕了。周五抵达后我们感到非常炎热,于是去湖里游泳,结果发现水面上覆盖着一层灰烬,黑色的灰烬正落在我们身上。”他正与妻子 48 岁的海伦 (Helen)(就职于希灵登 (Hillingdon) 的儿童服务部门)以及 10 岁的儿子詹姆斯 (James) 一起进行航海度假。尽管心存顾虑,他们还是决定留下,希望火势能平息。“第二天早上,在所有人离开时,我们买了法棍和牛角面包,然后我认为,我们最好理智一点,赶紧离开这里,”戴维斯夫人说道。戴维斯一家表示,他们从未收到过任何官方的疏散警报。“我们被告知警告信息将发送到法国手机上,然后营地会为没有手机的人鸣响警报,”戴维斯夫人说。“但我们从未听到过任何警报声。”戴维斯先生补充道:“从技术上讲,我们不算被疏散者,因为没有人叫我们走,但营地里只剩下十来个人,于是我们决定加入撤离行列。营地管理人员试图向人们保证,这里不在火灾影响区域。这有点像电影《大白鲨》,警察局长告诉人们离开水面,而市长却坚持说海滩是安全的。”这一家人开车前往波尔多并入住酒店,决定接下来的行动。“我们将在周一离开这里,”戴维斯夫人说。“我们在阿尔卑斯山有朋友,所以可能会去那里,或者来一次公路旅行然后回家。”
直到周日,法国当局才建议度假者远离波尔多所在的吉伦特省。在此之前,游客们被告知不要取消计划,但尽管部署了 2,500 名消防员、1,500 名士兵和水投轰炸机,火势依然失控,官员们最终改变了建议。“我强烈建议游客不要前来,不要进入吉伦特省,”大区区长索菲·布罗卡斯 (Sophie Brocas) 表示。“我也邀请已经在这里的游客考虑其他目的地。”戴维斯一家是法国和西班牙境内被迫离开家园或取消假期的 300,000 多人中的一员。仅在法国西南部,就有超过 25 万人被疏散,其中大多数在吉伦特省。数千名疏散者睡在波尔多展览中心巨大的机库式建筑的折叠床上。其中一人是斯特凡·拉菲特 (Stéphane Lafitte),他和妻子以及法国斗牛犬鲍比 (Bobby) 从他们位于圣梅达尔-昂-雅莱斯 (Saint-Médard-en-Jalles) 的家中被疏散。“我们整个镇都被疏散了。周五深夜收到警告后,大约 20,000 人离开了,”52 岁的拉菲特说。“我的儿子在波 (Pau) 跟我父母在一起。他很幸运没在这儿。”他表示,当局对山火的准备不足。“随着气候变化,这种情况每”
亚当·戴维斯及其妻子海伦和 10 岁的儿子詹姆斯曾在拉卡诺湖露营,但决定疏散。他可以看到勒波日村庄在燃烧(左上图)。
今年。我们的消防飞机产自加拿大,但法国应该制造自己的飞机。” 许多撤离者表示,他们担心自己的房屋会被洗劫。一名男子在开车离开撤离区时被逮捕,涉嫌入室盗窃,车内载有 40 多瓶昂贵的年份葡萄酒。 克罗地亚向法国借了两架水上灭火飞机,其他欧洲国家也派遣了应急工作人员。 爱德华·奇泽姆(Edward Chisholm)及其家人在上周撤离时离开了他们在卡费雷特(Cap Ferret)半岛的度假屋。38, 岁的奇泽姆是一位居住在瑞士的英国作家,他表示在决定是否离开该地区之前,他每小时都会检查一次风向和政府的最新消息。 他此前与女友和四岁的儿子住在格朗皮凯(Grand Piquey)的一栋租赁别墅中,但在火灾席卷该地区的松林后离开。 奇泽姆将开车离开时的场景描述为“末日般”的景象,房屋被封死,烟雾在上方翻滚。 “这里只有一条路,所以随着火势蔓延,[当局] 越来越担心人们无法离开半岛。于是他们开始撤离,”他说。 “那里像一座鬼城。气氛非常诡异……周围所有的房子里,每个人都在收拾东西,天空呈现出一种焦灼的颜色。我们能闻到烟味,而且有灰烬落下。” 在卡费雷特半岛对岸,奇泽姆目前与家人住在海滨小镇阿尔卡雄(Arcachon),该地区仍处于“黑色预警”状态。 部分海滩已关闭,高风险地区的休闲和体育活动已被禁止。前往波尔多的铁路服务已取消,附近 A63 高速公路(通往西班牙边境的主要干道)的部分路段已关闭。 “氛围相当超现实,”奇泽姆说。“地平线上有几柱浓烟。我们必须密切关注所有新闻。就像新冠疫情刚开始时一样,没人真正知道发生了什么。” 周日,在距离波尔多以西约 15 英里的马什普里姆(Marcheprime),松树像火柴一样燃烧,火焰高达 40 米。据报道,当局已制定应急计划,准备撤离这座拥有 267,000 人的城市。 市长安托万·卡泽纳夫(Thomas Cazenave)表示,火场距离波尔多郊区仅 9 英里,当局已“准备好应对任何情况”,但他淡化了形势,称“目前没有计划撤离”。 地区卫生机构警告称,细颗粒物比例已达到危险水平,建议人们尽可能留在室内,并在室外佩戴口罩。 “在新阿基坦(Nouvelle-Aquitaine)地区的四个省,我们已经超过了细颗粒物预警阈值,”地区卫生机构副局长塞西尔·塔利亚纳(Cécile Tagliana)表示,但未给出具体数字。她建议居民关闭窗户。 她补充说,2.5 million 份 FFP2 呼吸口罩正分发至药店,并在室外佩戴。医生表示,传统的 FFP1 口罩不能提供足够的保护。 布罗卡斯警告说,火势可能会恶化。“不幸的是,从周二起,气温预计将再次升至 38C 或 40C 的极高水平,这可能会加剧这一现象,”这位省长在新闻发布会上告知。 法国西南部约 240 栋房屋被毁,75 名消防员受伤。阿尔卑斯山、里维埃拉北部的丘陵地带以及科西嘉岛同样发生了猛烈山火。上周,吉伦特省有两名消防员丧生。 一名男子因在森林中吸烟被捕,另有两人因烧烤被捕。据信,许多火灾是由纵火者引起或因粗心大意导致。
10 英里
由 Shanti Das, Lara Bowman 和 David Sharrock 参与报道
买了我们的可颂面包就逃跑了’ 数千人被疏散 但西班牙山火 正得到控制
湖的另一侧。上图:西班牙阿维拉省 La Adrada 的一场火灾已成为该国有记录以来最大规模的火灾
Shanti Das
英国气象局警告称,英国本周将面临夏季第四次热浪,高温干旱的天气将带来“异常严重”的野火风险。
在经历了昨天的零星降雨和气温下降后,预报员预测英格兰南部部分地区将在周三再次达到热浪标准,最高气温将达 32C 或 33C。在其他地区,其阈值(定义为该地区异常高温且持续三天以上)可能会在周四达到。
据英国气象局称,此次天气可能出现“南北分化”——北爱尔兰、苏格兰和英格兰北部将经历阴雨天气,而非持续的阳光。在南部,极端高温可能是短暂的,气温将在周末前恢复正常。
但最近的一波高温天气意味着,本月最终可能会成为有记录以来最热的七月之一——全英气温比平均水平高出约 3C。
在苏格兰,凯恩戈姆山国家公园(Cairngorms National Park)在周末被宣布进入重大事件状态,由于天气恶化了自本月中旬以来一直肆虐的火灾,一个村庄的居民被疏散。超过 500 名消防员被部署到现场。
根据英国气象局的数据,英格兰南部目前的七月降雨量仅为平均水平的 1 per cent,英格兰整体为 5 per cent,而全英国则为 20 per cent。
高级业务气象学家丹·斯特劳德(Dan Stroud)表示:“就野火而言,显然干旱高温条件的持续提高了火灾风险。这种风险依然存在。”
根据英国自然环境局(Natural England)和威尔士自然资源局(Natural Resources Wales)使用的英国气象局数据,从周三起,英格兰东部、东南部和南部的部分地区最有可能出现这一问题。
热浪正给基础设施、医疗服务和经济带来压力。在本月早些时候的上一波热浪期间,铁路乘客被建议除必要行程外,避免在部分路线上出行。在 6 月下旬,东南英格兰在经历极端高温后出现雷暴,导致超过 1,000 趟航班延误或取消。
部分学校、商店和办公室提前关闭。《卫报》报道称,由于对高温的担忧,维多利亚与阿尔伯特博物馆(V&A museum)伦敦四个场馆的 300 多名员工正在就热浪罢工进行投票。
根据帝国学院(Imperial College London)、英国气象局和伦敦卫生与热带医学院的一个团队的数据,在 5 月和 6 月的英格兰和威尔士热浪期间,估计有超过 2,700 人死于与高温相关的原因。
此外还存在经济成本:根据格兰瑟姆气候变化研究所(Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change)的一项分析,英国 6 月的热浪导致经济产出损失超过 £1 billion。
David Sharrock 马德里
政府在国家紧急状态进入第三天时表示,迫使近 80,000 人撤离的山火仍在马德里周边燃烧,但目前已得到控制。
瓦伦西亚地区也在进行火灾撤离,在马尼塞斯的一场山火中有一名男子死亡,这是此次紧急状态中记录到的西班牙首位遇难者。
“我们前方仍有几个艰难的时刻,”首相佩德罗·桑切斯在访问阿维拉的火灾受灾地区时表示。昨日,该地火灾在烧毁 50,000 公顷土地后,正式成为西班牙历史上规模最大的火灾。
他说:“这个周末我们有一个机会窗口来对抗山火,从而保护生命,保护人口中心,并最终尽可能地将这场极其严重的山火控制住。”
军事紧急部队副主管费尔南多·马丁·帕斯夸尔表示,他们正以“极高效率地在多个战线上遏制并稳定”阿维拉、马德里和托莱多的火势。
他说:“在很多情况下,局势超出了我们的灭火能力,尽管我们正在寻找合适防御线以遏制火势的方法。”
首都西部的马德里山脉传统上是马德里居民在夏季避暑、寻找凉爽夜晚的去处。但过去四天改变了这里的景观,数千名撤离者在体育中心露营的景象震惊了许多人。
根据昨日公布的最新政府数据,西班牙共有 76,000 人被撤离,另有 30,000 人被禁足在家。
桑切斯表示,他的政府将在周二宣布火灾受影响地区进入民防紧急状态,以解锁恢复资金。他说,仅今年西班牙就有超过 150,000 公顷土地被焚毁,是去年同期被毁面积的六倍,这需要一个“关于气候紧急状态的重大公共协议”,以协调中央政府与地方行政部门。
竞争对手——保守派的人民党 (PP) 和桑切斯的社会党已宣布休战,这与 2024 年瓦伦西亚洪水期间的互相指责形成了对比,那次洪水至少造成 232 人死亡。
国王费利佩访问了受灾地区撤离者的一个接收中心,在那里,他与在体育中心度过第二或第三个夜晚的人们进行了交谈。
“有些人经历了非常糟糕的时光,有些人已经离开家四天了,有些人失去了许多财产。总的来说,我们失去了无法估量的自然遗产,”国王告诉记者。
超市寻求英国沙拉种植者填充货架
Charlotte Reck
由于担心干旱影响进口作物,塞恩斯伯里 (Sainsbury’s) 将增加英国产番茄、黄瓜和辣椒的供应量。
这家英国第二大超市已与英国生产商 Evesham Vale Growers 和 Thanet Earth 签署了新的十年合作伙伴关系,以确保稳定供应。
极端天气过去曾严重影响农产品,阻碍运输,并迫使杂货供应商采取行动以避免产品短缺。
塞恩斯伯里表示,英国种植的番茄、辣椒和黄瓜已经是其沙拉系列的重要组成部分,但温暖种植区普遍出现的极端天气凸显了超市建立更具韧性的供应链的必要性。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 费利佩六世国王与莱蒂齐亚王后访问撤离者接收中心
[[IMG_XXXX]] 活跃山火 来源:Nasa Firms
M A D R I D 阿维拉
10 英里
它希望与 Thanet Earth 签署的长期协议能够使英国黄瓜的供应期限首次从夏季延伸至冬季,而此前英国在很大程度上依赖进口。新的英国冬季作物将在肯特郡的 Thanet Earth 种植,那里拥有英国最大的单点玻璃温室综合体。
协议带来的收益最早将于今年夏天随着新推出的 Taste the Difference 英国沙拉精选 800 克装礼盒而上架。
赛恩斯伯里公司(Sainsbury’s)的农产品类别总监 Hannah O’Reilly 表示:“投资更多英国本土生产并支持我们的供应商创新,有助于我们构建一个更强大、更具韧性的供应链。”
Thanet Earth 的技术总监 Rob James 表示:“以这种方式与赛恩斯伯里合作,意味着我们可以更确定地提前规划。”
Monday July 27 2026 | 泰晤士报 新闻
鸣禽:声乐三重唱组合 The Knightingales 上周末在伊普斯威奇特里尼蒂公园举行的萨福克军事展上,与一千多名历史重演者汇合。
波比·科隆卡 (Poppy Koronka) 健康记者
波比·科隆卡
去年英格兰的预期寿命达到了历史最高记录,但这些增长在全国范围内并未得到公平分配。 根据金莎基金会 (King’s Fund) 的分析,在过去十年中,北方几乎一半的人口预期寿命没有改善,一直处于全国最低水平。 尽管伦敦在疫情期间的预期寿命下降幅度最大,但伦敦、东部、东南部和西南部地区的长寿情况有所改善。在全国最贫困的 30% 人口中,他们在到 2022-24 年为止的十年间,预期寿命有所下降或没有改善。 金莎基金会高级研究员维娜·拉利 (Veena Raleigh) 表示: “在南方及较富裕地区健康状况改善的情况下,我们北方和贫困社区的人们在十年间长寿情况几乎没有改善,这对一个富裕国家来说是一个耻辱。解决国民健康的这种不平等不仅是社会正义的问题,而且还将减轻国民医疗服务体系 (NHS) 的压力,降低因健康不佳带来的高昂经济成本。 “鉴于国家面临的经济限制,改善人口健康并减少根深蒂固的健康不平等,现在比以往任何时候都更紧迫,但同时也更具挑战性。这将需要协同且大胆的跨政府行动,以减少很大程度上可预防的疾病,例如与不良饮食、饮酒和吸烟相关的心血管疾病和糖尿病,并解决导致持续健康状况不佳的更广泛的决定因素,尤其是北方和贫困社区。”
[图表:英格兰预期寿命] 北东部 (North East) 伦敦 (London) 东南部 (South East) 西南部 (South West) 英格兰东部 (East of England) 东米德兰兹 (East Midlands) 西米德兰兹 (West Midlands) 西北部 (North West)
女性 85
2011-13 2017-19 2017-19 2023-25 来源:ONS (2025, OHID (2026)
男性 81
2011-13 2023-25
健康预期寿命(即一个人预期能健康生活的年数)下降了约 2.5 年。富裕地区的人比贫困地区的人平均健康生活时间长 6 到 7 年。 数据显示,在 2022-24 年,生活在英格兰最不贫困的 10% 地区的男性,其整体预期寿命比最贫困 10% 地区的男性长约 10 年。女性的差距为 8 年。 然而,健康预期寿命的差距更大,达到了 20 年。这意味着最贫困地区的人不仅寿命较短,而且在健康状况不佳的情况下生活的时间更长。 对比伦敦与东北部的人口情况可以发现,北方人在心脏病和癌症导致的早逝人数,以及自杀和与酒精及药物滥用相关的死亡人数方面表现糟糕。 在所有可比的高收入国家中,除了德国和美国,英格兰的预期寿命最低。 卫生与社会关怀部表示:“一个人的邮政编码绝不应该决定其寿命,本届政府决心解决英国境内依然存在的严重不平等现象。 “我们已经在采取行动,从更公平地分配全科医生 (GP) 资金,到在最需要的地区建立先导性的社区健康中心。但我们现在将在向当地社区下放权力方面走得更远,将决策权交给最了解当地情况的人,从而推动持久的变革。”
被允许执业而起诉
这 21 名医生在发生“人为错误”后对该学院采取法律行动。该错误导致数百名在 2023 年 9 月参加皇家内科医学院会员资格考试(Membership of Royal Colleges of Physicians)第二部分笔试的医生被错误通知已通过考试。 其中许多医生在不知晓自己不具备执业资格的情况下工作了一年多。根据《星期日电讯报》看到的“索赔函”,受此错误影响的人员“承受了直接的职业不确定性、专业尴尬和精神痛苦,以及健康和财务方面的影响”。 在 1,451 名参加考试的人员中,61 人在通过考试的情况下被误告知失败,而 222 人在失败的情况下被告知通过。这一错误直到 18 个月后的 2025 年 2 月才被揭露,当时另一起无关的考试错误引发了对过去结果的审计。 《泰晤士报》已要求皇家内科医学院(RCP)发表评论。英国皇家内科医学院联合会确认了该法律索赔,并表示:“因此,在案件审理期间,我们不便就此具体发表评论。此次事件的严重性已得到认可,三所学院及联合会对由此造成的痛苦和干扰表示歉意。”
® No 2630
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1 稻田谷物 (4)
2 德国西部河流 (5)
3 鸡蛋的一部分 (5)
4 闪烁的,闪光的 (9)
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答案见 T2 MindGames 第 15 页
隐喻谜题见 T2 MindGames 第 14 页
非法移民小艇指控
四人死于车祸
护理人员被除名
本杰明·索瑟姆(Benjamin Southam)去年 6 月在伊普斯威奇刑事法院被判定犯有窥淫罪。他现已被移出护理人员注册名单。
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Jessica Sharkey 犯罪报道记者
来自青少年司法委员会(Youth Justice Board)的数据显示,2025 年 10 至 17 岁儿童犯下的 86 起已证实的强奸罪中,有 19 起导致监禁,占案件总数的 22%。 在过去的五年中,年轻...
这场悲剧中的人物 关系诡谲且不断增加
疑似之子、一名治疗师以及一名 英国翻译,大卫·夏洛克 (David Sharrock) 发自蒙特塞拉特 (Montserrat) 的报道
蒙特塞拉特
打破了前往蒙特塞拉特修道院朝圣之路上的寂静。这座本笃会修道院被尊为加泰罗尼亚的精神与国家象征。 很难想象 2024 年 12 月,在 Camí de les Feixades 的高处发生了什么——当时 71 岁的芒果 (Mango) 时尚帝国亿万富翁创始人伊萨克·安迪奇 (Isak Andic) 与其 45 岁的儿子乔纳森 (Jonathan) 徒步旅行时坠亡。在 7 月中旬的一个炎热早晨,当西班牙乡村各地的山火威胁处于高位时,这条陡峭山峰与深邃峡谷交错的路线上没有一名徒步者。 这座圣山长期以来一直吸引着寻求精神慰藉的朝圣者,登顶路径被评定为简单,大部分路段仅由一根低矮的单金属杆保护。两年前,乔纳森·安迪奇告诉急救人员,尽管有简单的防护措施,他的父亲还是跌落了。“我需要帮助,”他说,“我想他掉下去了
来自该委员会的另一份通过信息自由请求获得的数据显示,去年由 10 至 17 岁青少年实施的已证实性犯罪有 314 起,比 2021 年的 227 起增加了 38%。绝大多数罪犯是 15 至 17 岁的男孩。 转介令(针对初犯者的社区矫正 sentence)是
他的父亲,这位加泰罗尼亚最富有的人,坠落 100 米身亡,这在西班牙境内,尤其是在加泰罗尼亚上流社会中引起了巨大的悲痛与震惊。一名熟人本周告诉《泰晤斯报》,移民自土耳其的伊萨克是一位受欢迎的人物,也是一位慷慨的东道主,在去世前几周,他还在家中接待了包括费兰·阿德里亚 (Ferran Adrià) 在内的顶尖厨师,他们在伊萨克著名的酒窖中饮用了最顶级的葡萄酒。 长期以来,这似乎是一起结论明确的案件。随后,在一次震惊欧洲最富裕家庭之一的丑闻中,乔纳森因涉嫌将父亲推下山导致其死亡而被逮捕。 他是三个孩子中的长子,在 5 月被捕前,担任芒果公司董事会的副主席。他的父亲在 1984 年将该公司从一家巴塞罗那单店发展成为一家全球零售商,在 120 个市场拥有约 2,900 家门店,营收接近 €3.8 billion。 加泰罗尼亚警方 (Mossos d’Esquadra) 最初接受了意外坠落的理论,并在 2025 年 1 月结案。然而,从第一天起,人们就对死亡情况存有疑虑。 几周之内,案件被重新启动。 侦探们对乔纳森证词中根本性的矛盾感到困惑。在一次陈述中,他距离
[[IMG_XXXX]] 伊萨克·安迪奇 2011 年与凯特·莫斯 (Kate Moss) 合影。左侧为修道院及他 2024 年坠亡的山峰。其子乔纳森(最右)目前正接受调查。 下方:治疗师玛丽亚·朱莉亚·吕德瓦尔特 (Maria Julia Lüderwaldt)
青年捐赠基金 (Youth Endowment Fund) 本月对政府数据的一项分析发现,去年因性犯罪而被逮捕的儿童人数达到十年来的最高点,共 3,809 人。 与此同时,因不雅图像罪(包括拍摄、持有或分发性相关图像)而受到警告或定罪的儿童人数
他看到他的父亲在尖叫中摔下。 法官随后的令状指出, 这些说法“彼此不相兼容”。 这次坠落揭露了在伊萨克去世前几个月内家庭内部的深刻分歧,当时他计划将其 €4.5 billion 的财产重组为一个慈善基金会。 尸检显示,他的双手没有本能制动时留下的伤口。伤情表明他是脚先着地摔下的,“仿佛从滑梯上滑下”一般。在山警看来,悬崖边缘的一个打滑痕迹并不像是意外失足所留下的。 安迪克案件的核心人物是玛丽亚·朱莉亚·吕德瓦尔特 (Maria Julia Lüderwaldt),一名来自厄瓜多尔的未注册心理治疗师。据报道,她作为许多西班牙精英阶层的朋友、心腹和治疗师,接诊对象涵盖了从桑切斯-维卡里奥 (Sánchez Vicario) 网球家族到西班牙国王此前名声扫地的前女婿伊纳基·乌尔丹加林 (Iñaki Urdangarin) 的所有人。安迪克一家在 2023, 开始接受她的治疗,这是在伊萨克的伴侣埃斯特法妮亚·克努特 (Estefania Knuth) 的建议下进行的,她希望化解父子矛盾。但据检察官称,吕德瓦尔特在财务纠纷中似乎站在了乔纳森这一边,甚至警告伊萨克,除非他向儿子预付 €40 million 的遗产,否则她将停止为该家庭提供治疗。
两名 15 岁的男孩在本月被判处四年拘留,原因是他们在汉普郡的福丁桥 (Fordingbridge) 强奸了两名女孩。此前上诉法院裁定,他们最初被判的非监禁刑期过于轻微。受害者当时年仅 14 和 15, 岁,分别在 2024 年 11 月和去年 1 月被这两名被称为 X 和 Y 的男孩在不同事件中强奸。第三名
JULIEN M. HEKIMIAN/GETTY IMAGES
吕德瓦尔特不寻常的治疗方法现在看来与调查相关。拉奎尔·涅托-加尔万 (Raquel Nieto Galvan) 法官已命令警方调查是否可能存在“第三人”直接或间接地参与了这次死亡。 本周早些时候,另一个人物进入了故事:吕德瓦尔特偶尔聘请的助手,一名身份为 Jo 的英国翻译。据巴塞罗那的《先锋报》(La Vanguardia) 报道,作为一项非传统的治疗练习,Jo 被要求为乔纳森寻找一条合适的步行路线,并选择了蒙特塞拉特 (Montserrat) 山脉的一条小径。 Jo 在 7, 2024, 12 月陪同乔纳森前往那里,就在其父亲去世前一周。吕德瓦尔特的助手同时也担任其翻译,出生于英国但居住在巴塞罗那。她说,由于知道内情,她经历了一年多的失眠之夜,随后向警方提供了两份自愿陈述书。她尚未被公开姓名。 乔纳森·安迪克坚持认为他父亲的死是一次意外。据了解,Jo 告诉警方,吕德瓦尔特指示儿子将其父亲——
今年 5 月,在南安普敦刑事法院,这些青少年在面临十项强奸指控和七项猥亵图像罪名时免于监禁,而是收到了青少年康复指令,这是一种基于社区的判决。 此案引发了受害者家属以及整个政治光谱的公开谴责。基尔·斯塔默爵士 (Sir Keir Starmer) 称此案“令人心碎”。
Lüderwaldt 的一名患者告诉《国家报》(El Pais):“你不会抗议,但你离开时流着泪且感到愧疚。”这位 58 岁的人补充道:“她收费不高,但你最终会去得更勤,而且全家人都会去。我从每周一次增加到了三次。每当我遇到问题,我就会给她打电话说:‘我该怎么办?’”
此案揭露了巨额财富背后残酷的计算方式。Isak 的遗嘱将其大部分财产平均分给三个孩子,给 Knuth 留了 €5。她认为这少得令人感到被侮辱,并要求 €70。就在 Jonathan 被捕前几周,兄弟姐妹们同意向她支付 €27 的和解金。Jonathan 的姐姐 Judith 和 Sarah 为其兄弟辩护,并表示她们计划自行创建 Isak Andic 基金会。法官已下令对这次致命坠落进行法医重建,侦探们正在分析 Jonathan 在一次前往厄瓜多尔旅行期间的通信记录,此前有一部手机在“奇怪的情况下”失踪。
2024 年 12 月那个周六早晨究竟发生了什么,可能永远无法确定。除了 Jonathan 本人之外没有目击者。正如法官所承认的,此案依赖于一个“迹象累积”——这些间接证据交织在一起,可能暗示有预谋和恶意,但无法得出结论性证明。在一条信息中,Jonathan 写信给他的父亲:“我对你认为我有能力杀死你并不感到惊讶。”他的辩护律师指出,同一条信息的结尾是:“我希望你享受这个夏天。给你很多个吻。”
对于 Andic 家族而言,这种失势的局面仍在继续。
巴德诺克坚持认为
Geraldine Scott
Geraldine Scott 政治副主编 为公交乘客、能源账单支付者和酒吧顾客宣布的方案。 决议基金会 (Resolution Foundation) 估计,上周的承诺在 2029-30. 年将花费超过 £2 billion。随着承诺的增加,伯纳姆已指示其内阁寻找削减开支的方案。 政府消息人士表示,他已经承诺履行工党的竞选宣言,即不提高所得税、国民保险或增值税 (VAT)。 据了解,伯纳姆认为英格兰社会护理的运作方式及其资金来源问题在之前的政府中被忽视了。 一名 No 10 消息人士表示:“安迪将直面那些被忽视的问题,让人们重新燃起希望。” “他有勇气解决那些被忽视多年且被认为无法解决的最困难问题。他不接受这种说法。这些问题不能再被忽视了。” 巴德诺克表示,社会护理是“对许多人来说极其重要的问题,对我来说也至关重要”。 她表示,尝试达成“持久共识”的努力已经失败,但只要不触碰她的红线,她愿意与首相合作。巴德诺克表示,“任何关于社会护理问题的解决方案,必须对那些在一生中做出准备并积蓄资金的人公平”,且所需资金必须通过削减开支来筹集。她补充道:“我希望我们能在这个问题上找到共同点,我期待在这个至关重要的问题上与您合作。” 领导成人社会护理委员会的凯西准备发起一场关于该系统应如何融资的全国性对话。斯特里廷承认,他委任的审查
Geraldine Scott
《泰晤士报》披露,凯米·巴德诺克仅在通过削减开支而非提高税收来筹集资金的情况下,才会支持安迪·伯纳姆的社会护理改革。 在预计本周发布公告前给首相的一封信中,这位保守党领导人表示愿意在社会护理问题上与政府和其他政党合作,但为达成协议设定了两项“核心原则”。 她表示,在本次议会期间,由于债务预计每年增长,工党计划增加的借款将比其继承的计划多出超过 2500 亿英镑。 她警告伯纳姆不要通过增加税收来为他早期的宣布项目提供资金。她表示:“在工党领导下,税收负担已上升至历史最高水平,而且已经有推测称,您将在今年秋季的预算案中进一步增税,以支付您在第一周宣布的所有事项,以及国防投资计划中尚未填补的资金缺口。” 关于社会护理,她表示:“资金必须通过减少当前支出方案来筹集。您必须排除任何最终将由下一代承担的增税或增加借款行为。” 伯纳姆将于本周发表关于社会护理的演说,并认为这是一个紧迫的问题。 国防大臣韦斯·斯特里廷昨天建议,由布莱克斯托克凯西女男爵开展的审查可以提前提交报告。伯纳姆和财政大臣约翰·希利面临压力,需要解释他们将如何维持支持
自由民主党(Liberal Democrats)被指在接受一名英国最大的跨性别事业资助者数十万英镑的捐款后,弱化了其在女性权利问题上的立场。
活动团体“性别至关重要”(Sex Matters)表示,埃德·戴维(Ed Davey)爵士及自民党高级成员采取的一系列政策干预的时机,引发了人们的质疑:该党的立场是否在收到西蒙·鲁迪克(Simon Ruddick)的捐款后发生了转变。鲁迪克是一名金融家,他公开表示支持跨性别社区是其优先事项。
选举委员会(Electoral Commission)的记录显示,鲁迪克今年向该党捐款超过 £200,000。在LGBT慈善机构GiveOut发布的一次采访中, he 表示选择支持跨性别者,是因为他们是一个“极小且受到不成比例压迫”的群体,其权利正遭受攻击。
平等与人权委员会(EHRC)于5月提交国会的执业守则,针对最高法院去年4月的裁定提供了指导,该裁定认定《Equality Act 2010》中的“性别”是指生物学性别。守则指出,一项服务必须基于生物学性别提供,才能在法律上被认定为单性别服务,这意味着跨性别女性不应被允许进入女性厕所、更衣室及其他仅限女性使用的设施。
“性别至关重要”的倡议总监海伦·乔伊斯(Helen Joyce)表示:“自民党近几个月在基于性别的权利问题上明显退缩,以至于该党大多数议员签署了那份在法律上缺乏常识的、针对EHRC执业守则的早期议案。其时间点与一名对跨性别激进主义有重大个人利益的人提供的捐款惊人地一致。”
戴维和玛丽·戈德曼(Marie Goldman),该党的
作为卫生大臣时曾被认为“设置的时间太长”。 伯纳姆表示,该系统应“基于国民医疗服务体系(NHS)原则”运行,且在需求点免费,预计此举每年将花费 £18.5 billion。
《泰晤士报》周五报道称,这种“普及性”方案不太可能涵盖护理院的日常生活成本,如洗衣、食物、住宿和能源账单,这意味着居民每年可能仍面临数万英镑的账单。
伯纳姆自 2010, 起就一直追求建立国家护理服务体系,当时他作为卫生大臣撰写了一份白皮书,建议为所有人提供免费护理。然而,保守党关于“死亡税”的指控在选举前促使其提案夭折。
自民党党魁埃德·戴维爵士表示,他希望“首相的大门是敞开的,这样我们最终可以共同将其处理正确”。
预计伯纳姆在未来几天还将处理青年失业和权力下放问题,后者涉及将部分所得税收入交给市长用于城市建设。
据昨日报道,政府正积极权衡替代议会税(council tax)和印花税(stamp duty)的方案。
据《i Paper》报道,在伯纳姆入主 No 10 之前,财政部官员已经开始规划房产税的全面改革,以便新政府能够获得简报。史蒂夫·里德(Steve Reed)在作为住房大臣最后一次出席下议院专门委员会时确认,官员们正在研究这两项税收的改革方案。
女性与平等事务发言人,于上月致信给女性与平等事务部长布里奇特·菲利普森 (Bridget Phillipson),敦促其撤回该准则。当时,自由民主党女性权利团体“女性自由之声” (Liberal Voice for Women) 表示,领导层已“积极选择忽视”那些依赖单性别空间的女性。
自由民主党议员卢德福德男爵夫人 (Baroness Ludford) 表示,戴维 (Davey) 此前已接受最高法院的裁决,现在却在信函上签名,这令她感到“不安且困惑”。
鲁迪克 (Ruddick) 表示,自 1979 年为该党工作以来,他一直是自由民主党的支持者,并且他“选择再次向该党捐款,是因为我支持其目标和价值观”。他补充道:“我特别钦佩该党在埃德·戴维 (Ed Davey) 的领导下坚定地支持跨性别群体。我对自由民主党的政策完全没有参与,也从未期望过参与。”
自由民主党表示,对平等与人权委员会 (EHRC) 执业准则的担忧与任何捐款无关。该党表示:“许多人选择支持自由民主党,以进一步推进我们对国家的价值观和愿景,我们为党内政策由成员在会议上民主决定而感到自豪。”
安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 坐在一把位于 No 10 North 且印有曼彻斯特非正式座右铭的椅子上
政府前政治暴力顾问表示,部长们应考虑禁制一个激进的跨性别活动组织,该组织曾将目标对准国会议员的办公室。
沃尔尼勋爵(Lord Walney)在《泰晤士报》撰文称,Bash Back 团体的行为“理应获得比目前更多的关注”,且部长们应以导致“巴勒斯坦行动”(Palestine Action)被禁制的同一门槛来衡量该团体。
这个由跨性别者领导的直接行动团体在去年 7 月,当时韦斯·斯特里廷(Wes Streeting)担任卫生大臣时,对其办公室进行了破坏,并推动进入一个“跨性别愤怒的新时代”。
《泰晤士报》此前揭露,该团体曾为成员编写一份指南,敦促他们武装自己并进行重复的非法攻击。
该指南要求活动人士组建“独立的地方小组”,“确定目标”——包括国会议员、组织和政党会议——并“确保你的目标能被重复打击,直到他们停止”其“恐跨”活动。沃尔尼表示:“基于已在公共领域披露的证据,这构成了一个严肃的指控理由。”
此前,法院本周审理的一起案件中提到,安·威德科姆(Ann Widdecombe)头部被锤子击打 21 次。
沃尔尼强调,在诉讼程序进行期间,他没有暗示谁应为此负责,但他指出,Bash Back 在她去世后未撤回过任何相关材料,这是一个“公正的观察”。
他说:“没有删除一张蒙面、挥舞锤子的活动人士照片。也没有删除那份指导支持者选择政治目标并打击至其屈服的指南。”
本周,Bash Back 誓言要“抵抗”安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 的政府,并声称他在核心团队中任命了“偏执者和独裁者”。他们点名提到了斯特里廷、伊薇特·库珀(Yvette Cooper)、莎巴娜·马哈茂德(Shabana Mahmood)和布里吉特·菲利普森(Bridget Phillipson)。
该团体表示自己是非暴力的,并告知活动人士不要伤害他人。
然而,该指南列出了其所谓的直接行动策略,并承认这些行为“极少合法”。
I
—— 摘自托尼·威尔逊传记电影《24 小时派对人民》 (24 Hour Party People)。劳拉·昆斯伯格 (Laura Kuenssberg) 看到他办公室墙上的一张 Smiths 乐队金唱片。
并警告参与者,他们可能面临包括刑事破坏、持有攻击性武器和加重侵入在内的指控。该文件还包括关于实施攻击以及事后如何逃避侦查的实用建议。
装备章节列出了锤子等物品,并建议活动人士使用酒精清理工具,或在之后将其丢弃在“无人监管的住宅垃圾桶”中。
沃尔尼认为,政治暴力“并非始于一次袭击”,而是始于“一种氛围的创造:在这种氛围中,恐吓变得常态化,对手被非人性化,而支持者则被鼓励相信采取极端手段是正当的”。
该团体此前承认对一次攻击负责,该攻击迫使平等与人权委员会迁出了其位于沃克斯豪尔(Vauxhall)的办公室。本月,英国改革党(Reform UK)内政发言人齐亚·尤苏法(Zia Yusuf)表示,该党议员、伦科恩与赫尔斯比(Runcorn and Helsby)选区代表莎拉·波钦(Sarah Pochin)目前面临的最严重威胁来自该团体。Bash Back 表示这不属实。该团体已被联系请求置评。
内政部表示:“虽然抗议权是我们民主制度的基石,但这绝不能逾越底线,演变为恐吓、非法或暴力行为。”
“违者将面临法律的严厉制裁。”
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如果说“巴勒斯坦行动”(Palestine Action) 给我们带来了什么启示,那就是政府不能等到直接行动运动根深蒂固之后才采取行动。多年来,我们一直听到激进活动人士重复那个熟悉的口号,声称他们是“非暴力”的。但如果将其与他们的言论、意象和手段对照,这些话就显得苍白无力。
政治暴力并非始于一次袭击。它始于一种氛围的营造——在这种氛围中,恐吓被正常化,对手被非人化,而支持者则被鼓励相信极端手段是合理的。
这就是为什么激进的跨性别活动团体 Bash Back 的行为 deserves 比目前所受到的关注更为严肃的对待。本周,法庭获悉安·威德康姆 (Ann Widdecombe) 的头部被锤子敲击了 21 次。任何人都不应预判正在进行的法律程序,我在此也不对责任人或原因发表任何暗示。
然而,关于 Bash Back 的一个公正观察是:在她去世后的这几天里,该团体没有任何撤回之举。没有撤掉一张戴面具、挥舞锤子的活动人士照片。也没有撤掉那份指导支持者选择政治目标并对其进行打击直至其停止的指南。
一个真正致力于非暴力的组织,在目睹国家关注一名公众人物在自家中被杀害时,本应停下来反思。而这个组织没有。
从“巴勒斯坦行动”中得到的教训应该是显而易见的。英国政府花费了五年时间才对一个组织采取行动,而该组织的活动规模已从刑事损坏升级为对英国国防核心地点的持续攻击。
在此过程中,工人们因履行职责而受到恐吓;在一次对布里斯托尔 Elbit Systems 公司的突袭中,凯特·埃文斯 (Kate Evans) 警长在被大锤击中两次后脊柱骨折。负责此次袭击的活动人士因故意造成严重身体伤害被判处七年八个月监禁。直到军用飞机
强制投票被纳入考量——对政治冷感者处以 £10 罚金
Geraldine Scott 报道。强制性的“投票义务”将通过 £10 的罚金来执行。该提案将允许选民弃权,并豁免因疾病、残疾、身在国外或出于良心或宗教信仰而无法参与的人员。在过去一年成立的“强制投票运动”组织也一直在幕后与国会议员和贵族议员合作,以支持对《人民代表法案》的修订。该组织的 Charles White 表示:“无论政治光谱如何,政界人士对于选举投票率低的问题正日益表达担忧。英国不平等的选民结构导致经济上的失败被奖赏了数十年。这使得许多人对决策过程产生疏离感,增强了对政治的愤世嫉俗。”由 Bell Ribeiro-Addy 提出并获得工党、自由民主党和绿党议员支持的一项独立修正案则呼吁,强制投票应伴随一项公民教育计划。YouGov 去年 4 月为宪法协会 (Constitution Society) 开展的民调发现,48% 的公众支持强制投票,而 42% 的人不支持,仅有五分之一的人强烈反对。安迪·伯纳姆 已明确表示,他准备重新探讨英国选举政府的方式。IPPR 报告的主笔 Nick Garland 表示,政治家们倾向于优先考虑那些最有可能投票的群体的利益,从而造成了脱离政治的“恶性循环”。在 2024 年的选举中,18 至 24 岁人群的投票率为 56%,而 61 岁及以上人群的投票率则为 81%。此外,大学毕业生与学历最低人群之间存在 20 个百分点的差距。Garland 表示:“向更成比例的投票制度转变至关重要,但澳大利亚式的强制投票应该是其中一部分。”
根据一些 安迪·伯纳姆 最高级顾问看到的提案,投票将成为强制性的,并建议对留在家中不投票的人处以 £10 罚金。
国会议员已经尝试将强制投票纳入新政府继承的立法中,同时三家在工党政策圈具有影响力的智库也主张这一变革。
据了解,首相对选举改革感兴趣,并承诺将争取将其纳入下一份工党竞选宣言。虽然目前据信强制投票不在此计划之内,但在 安迪·伯纳姆 进入唐宁街之前,其过渡团队成员已看过相关提案,而主张该政策的文件则由目前在 10 号街担任高级职务的人员起草或批准。
Think Labour(前身为 Labour Together)在工党领导权之争前发布了一篇主张强制投票的论文。该文由 Alison Phillips 签署,她此后成为了 安迪·伯纳姆 的副幕僚长。
Demos 则分别敦促新首相在其就任的前 100 天内采取该政策。
第三次干预来自与工党关系密切的智库——公共政策研究所 (IPPR),该机构在 7 月 10 日发布了关于处以 £10 罚金以及在选票上增加“以上皆非”选项的提案。
据悉, 安迪·伯纳姆 的过渡团队成员已看过该报告,而目前在 10 号街工作的至少两名官员在 IPPR 任职期间就对其非常熟悉。
工党议员也支持这一变革。由 蒂普顿和威德尼斯伯里 议员 Antonia Bance 提出的《人民代表法案》修正案,将要求部长们制定一项强制...
在布里泽诺顿皇家空军基地 (RAF Brize Norton) 被喷漆后,政府得出结论,认为这种行为已经触及底线。今年 6 月,上诉法院维持了该决定,认定“巴勒斯坦行动”(Palestine Action) 并非其自称的透明且非暴力的抗议团体,而是一个计划通过秘密运作以规避检测的隐秘组织。我们不应在同一个错误上栽两次跟头。
“猛击回击”(Bash Back) 已经公开采用了许多使“巴勒斯坦行动”产生如此破坏性的手段。其指南承认其策略“极少合法”,并敦促活动人士组建独立的当地小组,确定目标并确保能够对其进行重复打击,直到对方停止活动。该指南还就如何实施攻击和逃避检测提供了实用建议。
国会议员和公共机构已经成为了目标。平等与人权委员会在办公大楼遭到攻击后,被迫搬离其位于沃克斯豪尔 (Vauxhall) 的总部。 “猛击回击”承认对此次破坏行为负责。该组织还声称对去年破坏韦斯·斯特里廷 (Wes Streeting) 选区办公室的行为负责,当时其窗户上被喷上了“儿童杀手”字样。其指南将同一办公室的照片作为合适目标的示例。在本月举行的一次新闻发布会上,英国改革党 (Reform UK) 的齐亚·尤苏法 (Zia Yusuf) 声称,该党在朗科恩和赫尔斯比 (Runcorn & Helsby) 选区的议员莎拉·波钦 (Sarah Pochin) 目前面临的最严重威胁来自“猛击回击”。
和平抗议是一项基本自由。发起运动、游说和激烈的分歧都是合法的。但有组织的恐吓则不然。
政府正确地得出结论:在某些情况下,系统性的刑事破坏行为可以证明采取禁止(组织)这一非常手段是合理的。部长们现在应该用同一个标准来衡量“猛击回击”。根据已公开的证据,该组织面临严重的指控。
延迟的代价显而易见。我们不能承受再等待五年才决定底线已被触碰。政府现在是时候采取行动,打击那些已经从抗议跨越到胁迫之线的人,以免为时太晚。
沃尔尼勋爵 (Lord Walney) 是政府前政治暴力与破坏行为独立顾问
Meta AI 眼镜 成为笑柄
Ellie McDonald
一系列以恋童癖金融家杰弗里·爱泼斯坦 (Jeffrey Epstein) 佩戴 Meta AI 眼镜为主题的恶搞广告,近日在伦敦各地的公交车站出现。这是一场针对隐私风险的游击抗议活动。
活动团体“每个人都讨厌埃隆” (Everyone Hates Elon) 在卡内基街 (Carnegie Street) 的一个公交车站放置了一幅爱泼斯坦的图像,并配以口号:“给那些不尊重同意权的人准备的眼镜。”
在 Meta 位于国王十字区 (King’s Cross) 的伦敦总部附近,另一张海报展示了一名名人佩戴着这款框架内置摄像头的椭圆框智能眼镜。该广告利用了视觉错觉:从远处看,它与正式的宣传图像毫无区别,但随着行人靠近,名人的面孔变得如骷髅般枯槁,文字也从“Meta AI glasses”变为:“Meta:我们一直在监视。”
去年,“每个人都讨厌埃隆”制作了一幅海报,将特斯拉 (Tesla) 称为“万字车” (Swasticar),画面中埃隆·马斯克 (Elon Musk) 在唐纳德·特朗普 (Donald Trump) 的就职典礼上似乎在模仿纳粹礼。
针对这些指控,SpaceX 和特斯拉的首席执行官马斯克在 X 上发帖称:“坦率地说,他们需要更好的阴招。‘每个人都是希特勒’这种攻击方式太陈词滥调了。”
今年 2 月,该活动人士在桑德林厄姆庄园 (Sandringham Estate) 附近安装了一块告示牌,目标是指向安德鲁·蒙巴顿-温莎 (Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor),因为当时他面临压力,要求其就与爱泼斯坦的关系协助美国司法部调查。
该团体的发言人简 (Jane) 表示,Meta 眼镜极易被滥用。她说道:“这些眼镜将使在女性和儿童不知情的情况下对其进行录像变得轻而易举。有报道称,未来的版本甚至不会有那个提示他人正在录像的红灯。”
“这些眼镜感觉是在让变态和虐待者的生活变得更轻松,而我们实际上应该让女性的生活变得更轻松。它们是变态眼镜。我们想通过杰弗里·爱泼斯坦来强调谁会使用这些眼镜,那就是权势人物和虐待者。”
Ray-Ban Meta 智能眼镜的价格在 £247 到 £459, 之间,配备了一个 12-megapixel 的超广角摄像头,能够拍摄高分辨率照片和 3K 视频,同时配有隐蔽的麦克风和开放式音频。它们可以将内容直接直播到 Instagram 和 Facebook。
这次抗议正值有报道称 Meta 计划测试一款“超感知” AI 眼镜原型机。据《金融时报》报道,该设备将通过摄像头和音频录制持续捕获佩戴者的周围环境,从而允许 AI 助手回顾用户一天的细节,或回答有关他们所见之物的查询。
尽管 Meta 目前的智能眼镜在镜框角落设有 LED 灯,用于在佩戴者录像时发出信号,但高管们计划在拟议的
[[IMG_XXXX]] 伦敦公交车站 出现杰弗里
[[IMG_XXXX]] 佩戴智能眼镜
版本中不激活该指示灯。
据报道,超感官功能正被使用。
有报道称,伦敦有女性在未经同意的情况下被拍摄。在某些情况下,视频被分享到了社交媒体上。
简说道:“对于现在的年轻人来说,他们生活在一个不能随处被拍摄的世界之外。但现在,你完全没有隐私权。没有人同意被拍摄,感觉这种同意权已经被剥夺了。”
在本周的一篇 Instagram 帖子中,Ray-Ban 母公司 EssilorLuxottica 的总裁兼首席战略官 Leonardo Maria Del Vecchio 分享了一张恶搞广告的图片,其中包含这样一句话:“自风衣以来,色情技术最大的进步”,并配以一个大笑的表情符号。他随后写道:“如果我们不能拿这件事开玩笑,为什么有人会信任我们?”
Meta 表示:“我们从底层开始就为眼镜的摄像头内置了隐私保护——当你拍摄照片或视频以保存或分享时,捕捉 LED 灯会闪烁亮白色。这个灯没有关闭开关,因此佩戴眼镜的人和周围的人都会感到安心。”
Instagram 负责人 Adam Mosseri 表示:“现在,如果你把那个灯钻掉,眼镜基本上就会停止工作,因为我们发现有人尝试将其钻掉。此外,如果你发布利用他人或骚扰他人的内容……那么我们将删除该内容。”
EssilorLuxottica 已被联系要求发表评论。
消费者事务记者 安德鲁·埃尔森 (Andrew Ellson)
应对热浪有很多既定的方式:拉上窗帘,强占办公室的风扇,并抱怨其他国家在“应对这类事情上准备得更好”。而英国人现在发现了另一种方法:把一份牧羊人派放进烤箱,开一瓶红酒,然后假装现在是 11 月。
尽管近期气温高企,但购物者似乎已经厌倦了菲塔奶酪、西瓜和沙拉,转而重新拥抱令人安心的面点、肉汁和融化的奶酪。Waitrose 负责人表示,过去一个月,牧羊人派的销量比去年同期增长了 110 per cent,而鸡肉火腿格拉丹 (gratin) 的需求增长了 68 per cent。
鸡肉库尔玛 (korma) 配米饭的销量也增长了 67 per cent,而鸡肉、培根和韭葱派的需求则增长了 41 per cent。
即使是夏季公认的习惯——喝一些冰冷的、色浅的,且最好含有一片柑橘类水果的饮料——似乎也受到了威胁。同期,优质南非红酒的销量增长了 68 per cent。
Waitrose 将这一现象描述为“反向安慰饮食” (reverse comfort eating),即
充满活力且拥有完美收尾…… 跑者在5公里跑后通过美酒放松
Alisha Agarwal
小腿灼烧,疲劳感开始袭来,通常在跑步到这个阶段时,我不得不提醒自己,当初为什么会觉得跑5公里是个好主意。前方出现了一丝希望。雷盖特(Reigate)当地酒庄“Basil’s”的招牌就在正前方。欢迎来到“Run to Wine”,这是一个致力于将跑步与品酒相结合的俱乐部。该俱乐部由具备专业资质的葡萄酒专家兼超马跑者凯蒂·布鲁克(Katie Brook)主持,为葡萄酒爱好者和跑者提供一个在英国各地进行低压力跑步并建立联系的空间。“我有一个有趣的理论,认为葡萄酒和跑步是同一类事情,”布鲁克说道,“当你去约会,喝几杯葡萄酒,你会放下戒备,开始深入探讨一些话题。当你去跑步时,你的心理防线也会以同样的方式降低。”我渴望亲身体验这个理论。我在一个温暖的傍晚加入了该俱乐部,希望我那中等水平的跑步经验能让我撑到我最期待的部分:一次包含五款葡萄酒的品鉴会,并配有佛卡夏面包和冷盘肉类。虽然我在当地公园能轻松跑完5公里,但我知道萨里郡(Surrey)的雷盖特与通常激励我前进的泰晤士河沿岸平坦路径和凉风截然不同。布鲁克解释说,我们将跑过商业街,转向马场,挑战一座“简单的山丘”,最后回到酒庄。布鲁克将带领队伍,配速员则跟在末尾。在快速清点人数,并确保手表已开启且运动追踪应用 Strava 已启动后,我们沿着雷盖特商业街前行。我起初与布鲁克并肩而行,让她主导对话。她解释道:“我大约十年前搬到伦敦时开始跑步。我报名参加了 Never Stop London 的越野赛。当时我完全是个新手。”“赛后在酒吧里,每个人都开始谈论越野跑和超级马拉松,跑 100 公里,100 英里!我当时心想:‘这是什么鬼?你们吃什么,喝什么?去哪里上厕所?’”
超马跑被她称为“野餐式跑步”。她说:“你必须给自己补充能量。在每个补给站都有西瓜、能量块、能量棒、咸土豆!在意大利甚至有冷盘芝士拼盘。这简直就像在野餐。”而且,只要有冷盘拼盘的地方,就一定会有的一杯葡萄酒。我问她是否尝试过将这个概念反转。比如跑前品酒,或者干脆来一场“美酒巡礼”? “有几个人会提前到达并在跑步前喝一杯酒,”布鲁克说,“但是,很多人给我发了汤姆·吉尔比(Tom Gilbey)的短视频,当他——
[[IMG_XXXX]] (图片说明:在雷盖特商业街、田野和一座“简单山丘”跑过之后,在 Basil’s 享受葡萄酒品鉴。该俱乐部是葡萄酒爱好者和跑者建立联系的空间)
拒绝清爽的夏季菜肴,而倾向于选择通常与阴郁夜晚和羊毛袜相关的食物。人们无论天气如何都可能寻求熟悉且能带来情感安抚的食物,这一潜在想法得到了关于“安慰饮食”(comfort eating)运作方式之更广泛理解的支持。 我们对特定菜肴的依恋不仅是由饥饿感塑造的,还受到习惯、记忆和文化的驱动。 在世界上许多地区,在酷暑中食用热气腾腾或辛辣的食物并不被认为古怪。越南人吃越南河粉(Pho),韩国夏季流行热汤,而辛辣菜肴在墨西哥依然是主食。
跑了马拉松并品尝了葡萄酒, 我们绝对也得这么做一次。” 吉尔贝 (Gilbey),54 岁,一名葡萄酒鉴赏家,在 2024 年因在伦敦马拉松期间品尝 25 种葡萄酒而走红,为慈善事业筹集了超过 £14,000。 今天跑步的配速员珍妮·斯塔尔 (Jenny Starr) 谈到了一杯葡萄酒给她带来的动力:“这太有趣了。我喜欢尝试提高体能,但我也热爱葡萄酒。” 本月早些时候,《泰晤士报》报道称,根据 Strava 的数据,英国跑者的平均速度自疫情以来稳步下降。男性跑完 5 公里的平均时间已增加到 29 分钟,女性为 38 分钟。根据 Strava 的数据,在该应用上记录的跑步行程中,有 13% 的距离为 5 公里。 此时我发现自己处于人群中段,在跟上罗克珊·德索萨 (Roxanne D’Souza) 的步伐之前,我试图分辨出跑者和葡萄酒爱好者之间的界限,而她对两者的热爱“不相上下”。 当我问她为什么加入“Run to Wine”时,她说:“这挺有趣的,因为你知道在跑完步后,会有一个小奖品在等着你。” 我们转过弯,酒庄就在眼前。我用了相当克制的 33 分钟 57 秒完成了跑步。我在 Strava 上记录了成绩,然后翻看相册,附上一张我满头大汗地拿着手中那杯葡萄酒的照片。 布鲁克 (Brook) 详细讲解了每款葡萄酒。她首先介绍的是 Villiera Cap Classique brut,这是一款来自南非的起泡酒,她曾在南非学习葡萄酒知识。随后依次品鉴了 Tread Softly 的灰皮诺 (pinot grigio)、一款 Soave 葡萄酒、一款 Cap Amunt 桃红酒,最后以 Vins Oblidats Negre 2024 结束。 跑者的快感结合酒精带来的轻微微醺以及同伴间的情谊,完美地概括了“Run to Wine”的体验。我的跑友们也认同这一点。“在一些跑步俱乐部里,每个人体型完美,全部都是运动员,”德索萨指出,“而这里有一种社区感,这就是让我一直坚持参加的原因。”
丰盛的饮食正在取代轻食
在中国的部分地区,人们全年都喝热水。这种习惯表明,将食物分为“夏季”和“冬季”类别的英国准则远非普遍适用。 提高温度可能在生理上也有优势。热食或辛辣食物会激活口腔中的感受器,并能促进身体出汗。只要汗液能够蒸发(这是一个关于潮湿下午的重要前提),蒸发就会带走皮肤的热量。 研究还表明,运动前喝温水的人比喝冷水的人流失更多体热。 这种“反向慰藉饮食”或许也有极限。一个派能提供怀旧感、亲切感,甚至可能是情感上的修复。但它无法阻止烹饪者在设置到 200 摄氏度的烤箱旁度过整个夜晚。
可能降低 认知障碍风险
Kaya Burgess 科学记者
研究人员表示,将每日进食时间限制在九小时窗口内——并在就寝前四小时停止所有饮食——可能与降低超重女性患认知障碍(失智症)的风险相关。一项小型随机临床临床试验的结果于昨日在马里兰州举行的美国营养学会年会上公布,该研究旨在探讨作为间歇性禁食的一种形式,“限时饮食”是否会对认知障碍风险产生影响。新泽西州罗格斯大学的研究人员指出,通过任何健康方式减轻体重都与晚年神经退行性衰减率降低相关,但如果通过在每天特定的窗口期内进食来实现,可能会提供额外的助力。
该研究调查了 47 名年龄在 50 至 79 岁之间、被分类为超重或肥胖的女性。所有女性都被要求每天减少 500 卡路里的摄入量,其中 26 名参与者被要求将进食时间限制在九小时的窗口内,而其余人员则继续在典型的窗口期内进食,即当天第一餐和最后一餐之间间隔约 12 小时。限时组的参与者倾向于仅在上午 10 点到下午 6 点之间进食,平均窗口时间为 8.2 小时,而另一组的平均时间为 12.3 小时。
六个月后,参与者平均体重减轻了 6. 8kg,两组之间没有差异。然而,与另一组的表现相比,仅在九小时窗口内进食的人在“项目结束时的空间规划和问题解决测试中表现出显著改善”。他们还表现出在记忆力和学习测试中错误较少的趋势,但在多任务处理或反应时间测试的表现上没有显著差异。
“仅减轻体重就能抵御部分与年龄相关的认知衰退,而这些数据表明,如果你在就寝前四小时停止进食,并将每日食物摄入时间缩短至八到九小时,可能会获得额外收益,”领导该研究的罗格斯大学及罗格斯-RWJ医疗中心教授 Sue Shapses 博士说道。研究人员表示,需要对更大规模的群体进行进一步研究以确认这些发现。
以 £87m 价格出售
对于任何想要拥有自己一片天堂的 aspiring 大卫·爱登堡(David Attenborough),或者任何手里有 £87 million 闲钱想打造私人牧场的亿万富翁来说,现在有一个现代版的伊甸园在出售(David Byers 报道)。
一个拥有丰富海龟、海豚、火烈鸟和琵鹭种群的生态保护区,以及在尤卡坦半岛北部拥有四英里私人海滩的地产,刚刚被挂牌出售。据信,这是墨西哥历史上挂牌出售的最昂贵的私人庄园。
El Cuyo 庄园——距离坎昆由公路行驶两小时半路程,占地 346 英亩——是 Mónica Hernández 的热爱之作。
盖特威克机场断水,乘客愤怒不已
Lara Bowman 在英国,五分之一的新成立的以租为买(buy-to-let)业务是由海外房东设立的。 来自房地产代理公司 Hamptons 的数据显示,今年前六个月共有 27,200 家以租为买公司成立,其中 19.5 per cent 至少有一名非英国籍董事——这比 2016, 同期的 12.5 per cent 高出了 56 per cent。 印度投资者在董事中所占比例最高,其次是尼日利亚人和爱尔兰人。 Hamptons 的 David Fell 表示: “虽然在经历了多年的快速扩张后,以租为买公司的整体设立数量已稳定在每月 4,000 至 5,000 家之间,但国际资本对英国私人租赁市场的参与度仍处于历史高位。然而至关重要的是,这种参与在很大程度上是由居住在英国的非英国国民驱动的,而非海外投资者。 “对于那些从海外投资的人来说,个人持有仍然是首选方式,因为许多海外税制在处理租金收入方面往往比英国税务海关总署(HMRC)更为宽松。” 近年来,利用公司购买以租为买房产变得越来越流行,因为这能提供显著的税务优惠。以个人名义持有物业的房东所缴纳的税金……
昨天,由于附近一家处理厂停电,盖特威克机场失去了运行用水,导致乘客无法冲洗厕所、洗手或购买热饮。 机场表示,霍利(Horley)地区的供水问题影响了北侧和南侧航站楼。 尽管航班继续运行,但餐厅和咖啡馆无法制作饮品,饮水机失效,餐饮店被迫关闭或限制服务。 盖特威克机场在 X 上表示,已提供瓶装水,但乘客对此说法表示质疑,并称缺乏沟通。 SES Water 为东萨里郡以及西萨塞克斯郡、肯特郡和伦敦南部部分地区的 750,000 多名客户提供服务,该公司表示,其 Bough Beech 水处理厂的停电导致“部分客户”经历了“低水压或暂时失去供水”。 一名发言人表示:“我们正努力克服这些复杂情况,使处理厂恢复供水……盖特威克机场受到了影响,但在我们的团队努力尽快恢复正常服务的同时,我们正与他们协作。” 盖特威克机场在社交媒体上表示……
Ramírez,75, 岁,一名墨西哥景观设计师,以及她的丈夫 Aníbal González Torres,81, 岁,一名来自西班牙塞维利亚的获奖建筑师兼画家。 这对夫妇在 30 年前投资了这座偏远的庄园,他们将其描述为投入了“巨额资金”。 当他们购买 El Cuyo 时,该保护区的椰子农场由于 20 世纪 90 年代席卷尤卡坦半岛的一场毁灭性植物疫情而失败,数百万棵椰子树被摧毁,随后被军方砍伐并焚烧。 在树木消失后,这对夫妇在访问该地区时被火烈鸟和匙羹嘴鸟的景象所吸引,于是决定让这里回归自然。
昨天:“霍利 (Horley) 地区的水务问题导致今天上午机场出现混乱。该问题影响了两个航站楼的用水,目前正在调查中。
“机场将为乘客和员工提供瓶装水,并采取其他应急措施,以确保乘客的福祉。”
SES Water 在下午 6 点前不久在 X 上发布了更新:“受影响的客户(包括盖特威克机场)的供水正逐渐恢复——由于这是一个极不寻常且复杂的问题,网络需要时间才能完全恢复正常。我们想重申,我们的团队正在尽可能快地开展工作。”
关于洗手间、餐厅和其他服务何时恢复正常,并未提供更新信息。
乘客在社交媒体上发泄不满。许多人批评盖特威克机场的沟通工作,并质疑是否真的提供了瓶装水。夏洛特·安斯蒂 (Charlotte Anstey) 写道:“根本没看到有人在发水。我现在就在机场,被告知安检前的水管还能用——为什么不告诉我们最后的厕所在安检之前?”
另一名乘客保罗 (Paul) 写道:“这通知得太晚了。而且即便现在,机场里也没有任何公告。
混乱不堪,乘客根本不知道发生了什么。管理团队是休假去了,还是怎么回事。”
前工党影子国防大臣迈克尔·杜格尔 (Michael Dugher) 质疑为什么不允许乘客在关闭的餐厅内就座。他在社交媒体上写道:“至少允许人们使用所有关闭的餐厅和酒吧里的椅子。没水是一回事,但剥夺人们坐的地方又是另一回事……很多家庭不得不坐在地板上。”
最早在社交媒体上发出警报的人之一是播报员朱莉娅·哈特利-布鲁尔 (Julia Hartley-Brewer)。在盖特威克机场发布公告前,她写道:“如果你正前往盖特威克机场,了解以下情况可能会有所帮助:整个机场都没有自来水。
“这意味着没有咖啡,没有饮水机,不能冲厕所,也不能洗手。盖特威克机场竟然没费心向乘客发布公开公告。真是太‘体贴’了。”
在 SES Water 的长期韧性战略中,该公司表示,自 2020 年以来,影响 Bough Beech 水处理厂的停电次数增加了 70%,并警告这可能导致饮用水生产停工。
公司表示,工程师们正致力于尽快恢复供水,但尚未给出恢复正常服务的具体时间表。
[[IMG_XXXX]] El Cuyo 是墨西哥一个 346 英亩的保护区,已被预定为奢侈度假胜地。其所有者莫妮卡·埃尔南德斯·拉米雷斯 (Mónica Hernández Ramírez) 和阿尼巴尔·冈萨雷斯·托雷斯 (Aníbal González Torres) 在当地看到火烈鸟后,决定修复一座旧椰子农场。
“原有的植被在[椰子树被烧毁后]重新生长了起来,这里的野生动物令人惊叹,”埃尔南德斯·拉米雷斯说道。这对夫妇爱上了 El Cuyo——这里有一条白沙路,且没有永久性建筑——因为他们对自然保护充满热情。她说:“这里简直是天堂……我们的邻居是海龟——三种不同的品种。此外还有海豚。你知道,每到季节,海豚就会到来。所以这里真的非常独特且美丽。”
她的丈夫表示,他们如此热爱这片原始海滩,以至于他再也无法享受故乡西班牙的海滩了。“我再也不去那里的海滩了,”他开玩笑说。
他们已经获得了墨西哥政府的规划许可,在 El Cuyo 建立一个豪华住宅区——条件是他们必须遵守极其严格的生态保护要求。
风格建筑采用椭圆形,设有露天布局、木框架、石质特色墙以及由棕榈或草制成的坡顶茅草屋顶。 然而,考虑到他们的年龄,这对夫妇决定出售其储备地以及规划许可。 Hernández Ramírez 表示,这里对于生态学家来说非常完美。“居住在这里的人必须是自然的守护者,”她说道。
区域。他们与设计师 Casa e Progetti 合作,为度假村创建了一份蓝图,该度假村将使用回收的天然材料和可再生能源。 该计划包含 64 栋别墅,每栋别墅拥有 328 英尺的私人海滩,位于 2.5 至 6.9 英亩之间的地块上。每栋别墅面积为 5,000 平方英尺,设有四或五间卧室。它将以玛雅风格建造——
他们在抵押贷款利息上仅能获得 20% 的基本税率抵扣,但通过公司结构持有物业的人可以将 100% 的借贷成本从其税单中扣除。 Hamptons 估计,约 75% 的新以租养贷购房行为是通过公司结构持有的。去年成立的以租养贷公司接近 67,000 家,而 2015 年为 10,239 家。 由于部分受英国脱欧驱动的移民流,过去十年使用这种方式投资英国房产的国籍构成向东转移。 2016 年,该名单由英语国家和西欧国家的国籍主导。 当时,爱尔兰人是新成立企业中股东比例最高的国籍,占所有董事的 1.5%。中国人排名第二,印度人排名第三,名单中还包括德国人、法国人、意大利人、美国人和澳大利亚人。 今年的名单将印度人列在首位,占所有董事的 1.69%,名单中还包括尼日利亚人、罗马尼亚人、巴基斯坦人和立陶宛人。来自伦敦房产中介 Benham and Reeves 的 Marc von Grundherr 表示,他“注意到土耳其买家的兴趣明显增加”。 今年是自 2015 年以来,非英国股东董事的比例在十年中首次下降,而去年海外股东比例曾高达 20.4%。
2026 年 7 月 27 日,星期一 | the times 新闻 数百名卫生部门负责人薪酬高于首相,处于“奖励失败的文化”中
Poppy Koronka
约 574 名高级卫生领导者的薪资高于安迪·伯纳姆,一年内增长了 12%。 分析发现,有 1,758 名管理者的年薪超过 £100,000。
10,000
灵感来源:艺术家 Andrew “Mani” Manson 在西牛津社区中心外创作了一件向已故的大卫·霍克尼致敬的巨型作品。
Bill Curtis
国家医疗服务体系 (NHS) 信托机构和私人医疗服务提供者因未能保护女性而受到护理质量委员会 (CQC) 的批评,其中包括一些女性在面前面对男性脱衣,且无法使用性别专用厕所。 NHS England 的数据显示,去年有创纪录的 53,874 名患者在违反其自身指南的情况下在男女混住的住宿中接受治疗。这一总数是疫情前一年记录的 19,700 人的两倍多。 2010 年发布的非法定指南禁止男女混住,但化疗病房等情况除外,因为在这些地方患者“可能会从患有类似疾病的其他患者的陪伴中获得安慰”。然而,自那时起,女性仍不断报告其隐私和尊严受到侵害。 42 岁的 Alexis Quinn 表示,她在 2016 年的一个男女混住精神科病房中多次遭到性侵
影子健康大臣斯图尔特·安德鲁 (Stuart Andrew) 表示:“管理 NHS 是一项艰巨的工作,管理人员在取得成果后应当获得奖励。但在
在涉嫌遭受袭击后,工作人员决定将奎因 (Quinn) 拘留在隔离室中,她当时患有尚未诊断的自闭症,随后她设法逃脱。 她表示,那种脆弱感令人难以承受,并称该系统是“灾难的温床”。她说道: “每一个被安置在混性别住宿环境中的女性,都是另一个处于风险之中的‘坐以待毙’者。令人震惊的是,尽管有压倒性的证据表明这一问题正影响到越来越多的患者,NHS 的领导层却让该问题被忽视了。” CQC 在 4 月份发布的一份报告中发现,萨塞克斯伙伴 NHS 基金会信托 (Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust) 旗下由五个混性别社区精神健康危机设施组成的 The Havens 设施,在“保护患者免受伤害的风险方面运行不安全”。报告称:“我们观察到男性和女性患者在同一房间内接受护理,他们睡在仅由窗帘隔开的躺椅上,”调查员说道,并举例称一名男子因为房间缺乏通风而脱掉了衣服。 2022 年,来自妇女权利网络 (Women’s Rights Network) 的活动人士发现数
许多表现不佳的信托机构已引入新的首席执行官以改善服务,由于他们在医院改革方面拥有专业知识,通常被支付高薪。 根据该联盟的数据,东切郡 (East Cheshire) 的 A&E(急诊)候诊时间连续第二年最差。其首席执行官格德·墨菲 (Ged Murphy) 在 2024-25 年的薪资为 £377,500,高于前一年的 £172,500。 该联盟的研究员安妮·斯特里克兰 (Anne Strickland) 表示,伯纳姆 (Burnham) 的新政府“有一个早期的机会向纳税人证明,它将整治这种奖励失败的文化”。她补充道:“大臣们必须保持他们的”
患者失败
违反混性别住宿指南的情况
数据不可用
2012 14 16 18 20 22 24 26
来源:NHS England
开展该研究的玛丽·豪登 (Mary Howden) 表示:“当前混性别住宿违规行为的增加并非轻微的行政失误;这是一次保障失败,使女性面临可避免的风险。” CQC 批评了由埃塞克斯伙伴大学 NHS 基金会信托 (Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust) 运营的一家康复中心,称其存在“对性安全方面的担忧”。调查员发现,领导层“未能充分调查”涉嫌的犯罪行为,且“没有
得到了警示”。这份4月的报告指出,在之前的六个月中记录了 69 起事件,并发现了六起性安全事件的证据。 另外,私人住院药物滥用服务机构 Haynes Clinic 在3月的一份报告中被监管机构认定为“不合格”。 2023 年,利物浦的一家私人药物滥用中心 We Do Recover CIC 因在没有必要健康登记的情况下非法运营且未能达到基本安全标准而关闭,并面临巨额罚款。在使用该设施的男性和女性患者中,还被发现他们共享“相同的浴室和生活空间”。 CQC 表示:“所有患者都有权获得尊严和尊重的对待,并在周围环境中感到安全。我们期望服务提供者遵守法律以及关于男女混住的相关指南。” NHS 表示:“NHS 全力致力于提供同性住宿——虽然在某些临床情况下混住是必要的——但显然我们需要扭转这一不可接受的趋势,并消除不合理的违规行为。”
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GEOFFREY SWAINE/SHUTTERSTOCK
让失职的 NHS 主管承担责任。” 卫生部门表示:“我们已明确,薪酬必须与绩效挂钩。一项新政策意味着只有高绩效的领导者才能获得奖励,而那些未能改善服务并缩短候诊时间的人将不再获得自动加薪。”
多样性计划上 花费 £631m”
Jessica Sharkey 犯罪事务记者
Ben Ellery 副首席记者
由于测试发现含有过量的苯(一种可致癌的有毒化学物质),一款广受欢迎的儿童挤压玩具的多个版本已被发布全国性召回通知。
这些以“Squeezy Dumplings”名义销售的玩具,是装在小篮子形状的容器中、带有微笑面孔的软塑料饺子。在 TikTok 上出现大量展示拆箱、挤压和拉伸的视频并走红后,它们成为了今年校园里最盛行的狂潮之一。它们的吸引力结合了压力球的触感与……
突袭派对 在周末 Basingstoke 附近举行的瓦尔哈拉维京节(Valhalla Viking Festival)上的一名表演者,该节日活动包括宴会、模拟战斗、工作坊和各项活动
学习希腊语的热潮
乔治亚·兰伯特 (Georgia Lambert)
克里斯托弗·诺兰改编的《奥德赛》在电影迷中引起了轰动,但看来这部史诗也激励了数千人学习希腊语。语言学习网站 Preply 对 Google Trends 的分析显示,随着人们对这部电影的期待增加,英国境内搜索“学习希腊语”的次数在一个月内增长了 550 百分比,每月搜索量达到约 6,000 次。
尽管荷马的这部史诗是在近 3,000 年前用古希腊语创作的,但专家表示,这种痴迷是由渴望与电影中所描绘的神话、风景和历史建立联系的观众所驱动的。
Preply 的语言趋势专家马德琳·埃诺斯 (Madeline Enos) 表示:“荷马的《奥德赛》是用古希腊语创作的,这与如今在希腊使用的语言有显著不同。古希腊语提供了更紧密地接触荷马原著和更广泛古典世界的机会,而现代希腊语则能帮助人们接触当代希腊文化并与当今的母语者交流。”
她补充道:“无论人们是对荷马的语言还是对如今所说的希腊语感到好奇,这种火花都能引导他们更深地理解希腊的语言和文化遗产。”
古典文学的教学在学校和学院的准入方面面临挑战。虽然私立学校提供古典文学和古希腊语课程的可能性仍然要高得多,但公立部门学生的学习机会并不均衡。然而,希望引入或扩大这些学科的学校可以通过政府获取专业支持,以帮助他们实施课程。
2021 年,牛津大学神经科学家格林菲尔德女男爵 (Baroness Greenfield) 告诉《泰晤士报》教育委员会,古典文学研究在脑发育中可以发挥重要作用。
在 7 月 17 日电影上映前数月,“奥德赛效应”已在网上显现,Reddit 上的用户们在交流如何学习荷马希腊语(古希腊语的一种文学方言)的建议。
在英国,今年《奥德赛》的销量近 40,000 本,比去年增长了 70 百分比。在电影上映前的一周内,纸质书销量近 5,000 本。
采用了其他收藏热潮中所使用的“盲盒”形式,买家打开相同的密封罐,希望找到不寻常的颜色或稀有的闪粉版本。
在发现其外层苯浓度为每公斤 20 毫克后,产品安全与标准办公室已将该产品的仿制版本列为具有“严重”化学风险。
苯是一种致癌物。根据召回通知,吸入苯会刺激眼睛、鼻子和喉咙,而大量接触可能会导致皮肤刺激以及整个消化道产生灼烧感。
家长们被告知停止让孩子使用这些玩具,并将其放在孩子接触不到的地方。
官方召回名单中提到了总部位于卡迪夫 (Cardiff) 的分销商 Samsons Cash and Carry,但问题要广泛得多。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 玩具在小罐子内部有一个笑脸
PETER TARRY 为《泰晤士报》供图
如何保持希望
请加入我们,共度一个极其幽默且令人振奋的夜晚。本报专栏作家凯特琳·莫兰 (Caitlin Moran) 将在她的全国巡演伦敦站登台。她将与她的朋友兼同事——《泰晤士报》电台主持人雨果·里夫金德 (Hugo Rifkind) 展开对话,解读她的重要新书《如何保持希望:尝试让世界看起来没那么糟糕的一年》(How to be Hopeful: A Year of Attempting to Feel Less Awful About the World) 中的主题。
圣玛丽教堂,伦敦布赖恩斯顿广场,W1H 1PQ
更为普遍。在赫尔(Hull)的各家商店中,没收了 1,000 多个显然是伪造的 Squeezy Dumplings 玩具,因为其中一些被发现含有苯。贸易标准官员随后销毁了这些玩具。官员们警告说,不安全的仿制品可能很难与正品区分开来,并敦促家长检查包装并仅从信誉良好的零售商处购买。
此次召回涉及的中国制造产品不符合《2011年玩具(安全)条例》,其标签和安全标记也需要改进。产品或包装上没有批号或其他标识符,导致家长难以确定玩具是否受到影响。Samsons Cash and Carry 已向客户召回该产品。寻求进一步信息的业主已获建议联系该公司。
助力学习
Georgia Lambert, Riana McConochie
首个推行无智能手机学校政策的自治区校长们表示,没有这些设备并不会让孩子安全性降低,因为携带昂贵的手机往返学校反而会增加被盗风险。在巴内特(Barnet)去年 9 月推出英格兰首个全区范围的学校智能手机禁令后,此前已实施禁令的校长们表示,证据证明了他们的做法是正确的。他们报告称,课堂上的干扰减少了,网络欺凌减轻了,学生之间的面对面互动增加了,学校氛围也更加平静。该伦敦自治区的所有 103 所小学均禁止使用这些设备,23 所中学在今年的学生群体中取消了智能手机和智能手表。
然而,有几所中学的做法领先于时代。在东芬奇利(East Finchley)的毕晓普·道格拉斯天主教学校(Bishop Douglass Catholic School),白天禁止使用手机已实施 20 年以上。校长米歇尔·亨德森(Michelle Henderson)表示:“我们不认为携带手机必然能让孩子更安全。一部显眼的贵重智能手机会让年轻人更容易成为盗窃目标,而且在发生严重事故时,想象一个孩子能够拿出手机并安全地使用它通常是不切实际的。”相反,学生们被告知应向值得信赖的成年人寻求帮助,例如警察、交通工作人员和商店职员,他们在需要时可以联系家长或紧急服务部门。
亨德森表示,孩子的学业成绩也有所提高。该校的第六形式(sixth form)在巴内特非选拔性学校的进步排名中并列第一,在全国排名中处于前 7%之列。“无手机环境增强了课堂注意力,促进了积极行为,减少了欺凌机会,提高了出勤率,并支持每位学生的福祉。”在克拉里翁学校(Clarion School,一所中学兼第六形式学校),无手机政策于 2022 年引入,取代了之前的“视线之外”规定。校长克里斯·亨特(Chris Hunt)表示:“我们解决方案的灵感实际上来自我参加的一场音乐会,当时观众……”
明星拍卖珍宝,助力待发的加沙学者
一份带有注释的剧本、一条在舞台上佩戴过的项链以及一枚古董高级定制胸针,是三位英国最负盛名的女演员捐出的个人物品。她们此举旨在帮助新一代巴勒斯坦学者进入已录取他们的大学。
哈里特·沃尔特 (Dame Harriet Walter) 75岁、凡妮莎·雷德格雷夫 (Dame Vanessa Redgrave) 89岁以及珍妮特·苏兹曼 (Dame Janet Suzman) 87岁,是 23 位捐赠纪念品参加慈善拍卖的名人之一。此次拍卖旨在为加沙学生筹集奖学金,以便他们进入英国顶尖大学就读。拍卖的目标是为那些虽已获得大学录取资格,但若无经济支持则无法入学的才华横溢的学生提供一条生命线。
上个月,政府宣布,一组持有全额资助奖学金并符合移民规则的学生将获得帮助,离开加沙前往英国继续学业。在加沙,有两百多名学生获得了包括牛津大学和剑桥大学在内的大学录取名额,但无法离开。尽管 10 月宣布了停火,但危机仍在继续;根据加沙由哈马斯管理的卫生部的说法,以色列军队自那时起已造成一千多人死亡。
[[IMG_XXXX]] “是我,凯西。”昨日在伯明翰举行的“史上最风暴原野日”集会上的参与者。该活动在全球多个城市举行,通过重现流行音乐视频的编舞来庆祝凯特·布什 (Kate Bush) 的《风暴原野》(Wuthering Heights)。
【OCR清理说明:以下内容为文本片段,可能来自另一篇关于校园手机禁令的文章】
……会议成员被要求将手机放入可锁定的收纳袋中。我意识到这可能是学校环境的完美解决方案,因此我们在学校率先采用了这种方法。” 在这所学校,学生将手机锁在 Yondr 收纳袋中。高级教职员在校门口检查执行情况,进行随机抽包检查,并联系家长以核实学生声称未带设备到校的情况。未放入收纳袋的手机将被没收 7 天。学生曾尝试通过在袋中放入假手机而保留真实设备来规避系统,但持续的执行和随机检查几乎杜绝了这种情况,每年仅有极少数手机被没收。“我们观察到,学生之间的社交互动明显增加,他们在午餐时聊天,并在课前、课中和课后参加课外活动,”亨特 (Hunt) 说道。“学生们现在真正意识到,在校期间断开网络连接对他们有多大的益处。”
在伊丽莎白女王女子学校 (Queen Elizabeth’s Girls’ School),自 2017 年起,7 到 11 年级的学生就被禁止使用智能手机。在这所表现优异的非选拔制学院中,学生可以携带一部基础功能手机,但必须在到校前关机并将其放在不显眼的地方。任何智能手机或可上网设备将被没收 10 个教学日。校长维奥莱特·沃克 (Violet Walker) 表示:“有些家庭并不认同规则的改变。”家长们的主要顾虑是放学后无法与孩子保持联系或无法追踪其回家路径。然而,沃克表示,功能机运行良好,且许多家长使用 Apple AirTag 来追踪孩子。“禁令实施后,我们发现通过社交媒体进行的网络欺凌事件显著减少,”她补充道。
由议会所有的所有者巴内特教育与学习服务局 (Barnet Education and Learning Services) 的一名发言人表示:“研究表明,11-15 岁的儿童最容易受到社交媒体和通过智能手机上网带来的负面影响。我们鼓励家长将给孩子配备智能手机的时间延迟到至少 14 岁,将允许使用社交媒体的时间延迟到 16 岁。”
Girlguiding 揭晓了 30 多年来首次的大规模制服重新设计,旨在“培养真正的归属感”。
在对之前方案的简化版本中,在听取了数千名引导员(guides)、彩虹(rainbows)、棕色小童军(brownies)和游骑兵(rangers)的反馈并认为她们重视选择权后,成员只需穿着新系列中的一件上装即可被视为“穿着制服”。
Girlguiding 首席执行官 Felicity Oswald 在发布新制服时表示,该设计是与数千名女孩和年轻女性合作完成的,旨在给予女孩们“在感受到自己是我们这个伟大组织的一员的同时,能够自由表达自我的空间”。该组织表示,制服将该慈善机构的传承和传统品牌识别度与现代色彩和印花相结合,设计特点包括腰带中的隐藏口袋、拇指孔,以及可兼作斜挎包的徽章肩带。
该系列由 Hemingway Design 设计,由 30 件服装、15 件配饰和领巾组成,其中领巾可以个性化定制。
Girlguiding 表示,其在 6 月对英国 6 至 16 岁 2,000 名女孩进行的调查发现,93% 的人表示,当她们能够选择自己的造型方式时感到最舒适。Girlguiding 大使、广播员兼主持人 Angellica Bell 表示:“新制服赋予了女孩和志愿者拥抱个性的力量。”此次重新设计始于 2024 年 3 月,是对 1990 年版本的更新。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 女孩们穿着该系列产品,该系列包括 30 件服装和配饰
[[IMG_XXXX]] 哈丽埃特·沃尔特爵士(Dame Harriet Walter,左侧)捐赠了一本《尤利乌斯·凯撒》的剧本用于拍卖。瓦妮莎·雷德格雷夫爵士(Dame Vanessa Redgrave)佩戴着她捐赠的项链
拍卖品包括沃尔特爵士在伦敦 Donmar Warehouse 全女性版《尤利乌斯·凯撒》剧作中的剧本,以及她两本书的签名本。雷德格雷夫则捐赠了她在 2003 年百老汇复排尤金·奥尼尔(Eugene O’Neill)的《长日渐沉》中饰演玛丽·泰隆(Mary Tyrone)并获得托尼奖时佩戴的项链。Suzman 捐赠了一枚复古的 Christian Lacroix 胸针。
Paapa Essiedu, 36, 在即将播出的《哈利·波特》电视剧中饰演西弗勒斯·斯内普(Severus Snape),捐赠了他的《哈利·波特与魔法石》副本。他表示:“这本珍贵的旧书证明了奇迹是可以发生的。”
女演员 Juliet Stevenson, 69, 捐赠了她的《英美诗人及诗歌简明百科全书》副本,这是她最早拥有的诗集之一。她表示,参加这次拍卖“似乎是毋庸置疑的选择”。
资金将捐赠给教育慈善机构 Phoenix Space。
“TikTok 爷爷”誓言在抗癌徒步中坚持到底
他那艰苦的 462 英里 慈善募捐行走的一半, 里安娜·麦科诺基(Riana McConochie)报道
一名患有癌症的 78 岁 TikTok 创作者在横跨英格兰和威尔士的 450 多英里徒步旅程中已过半,旨在为慈善机构筹款。
威尔士祖父约翰·帕里于 6 月 21 日出发,并于昨日跨越英格兰与威尔士的边界,标志着其徒步行程已完成过半。
帕里的目标是沿着 Via Beata 路线,从英格兰最东端点(萨福克郡的洛威斯托夫特)徒步 462 英里,到达威尔士最西端点(彭布罗克郡的圣大卫角)。
帕里在 2024 年 10 月被诊断出患有癌症,此后他以 @Welsh-Grandad 的账号在 TikTok 上分享内容,以激励其他受此疾病影响的人们坚持战斗。
他正在为癌症研究基金会(Cancer Research)、麦克米伦癌症支持中心(Macmillan Cancer Support)、法利 hospice(Farleigh Hospice)和圣大卫 hospice(St David’s Hospice)筹款,并利用其在线平台记录旅途中的每一天。
到目前为止,帕里已筹集了 37,000 多英镑,向其 50,000 英镑的目标迈进,并收到了数百条评论和支持信息。
“我完全没预料到会有这样的反响。人们对我所做之事的反应以及我试图筹集的资金,简直太令人惊叹了,”他说道。
帕里表示,在挑战过程中,他从未感到挫败。
“即便在我精疲力竭、大汗淋漓且没水喝的时候,我脑海中想的全部是那些病情比我更严重、面临不确定未来的人们。”
“我知道有人比我承受更多,他们支撑着我,激励着我,”他说道。
在由家人和朋友组成的支持团队陪伴下,帕里在沿途遇到了粉丝、路人,甚至包括《舞动风暴》(Strictly Come Dancing)的明星劳伦·奥克利(Lauren Oakley)。“这种善良的——”
Andrew Ellson
Andrew Ellson
消费者事务记者
对于第一次约会的紧张感,传统的缓解方法一直是一杯烈酒。然而,对于许多英国年轻人来说,现在似乎是烧开水泡茶。
一项研究表明,这个国家最年轻的成年人正在给“荷兰式勇气”(Dutch courage)注入英国特色:近半数的Z世代表示,他们在重大时刻前会选择喝一杯茶而不是酒精来稳定情绪。
调查发现,在准备面对令人生畏的场合时,47%的18至27岁年轻人更倾向于选择茶而非酒精,这一比例几乎是婴儿潮一代(25%)的两倍。这项为Twinings品牌开展的调查结果反映了英国人与茶之间不断变化的关系中的一种矛盾。
研究一致表明,年轻成年人饮用红茶的数量少于他们的父母和祖父母,且咖啡是他们的默认含咖啡因饮品。最近的YouGov民调发现,在Z世代中,只有十分之一的人每天喝一杯茶,而X世代和婴儿潮一代中这一比例为三分之一。
然而,那些确实会烧水泡茶的人,似乎越来越倾向于将此行为保留给那些具有重要意义的时刻,从而将饮茶变成一种仪式。咖啡馆报告称,年轻顾客对抹茶等特种茶的需求量大增,这表明虽然Z世代喝茶的次数可能较少,但他们对于何时以及为何饮茶的选择更加挑剔。
最需要一杯“准备茶”的场合包括大学考试、工作会议、驾考以及与老板的艰难对话。
对于25, 岁的Isabella Ayala Heaton来说,茶是第一次约会时替代“液体自信”(酒精)的选择。“它能帮我进入正确的心境,”这位来自伦敦的摄像师说道,“我
[[IMG_XXXX]]
John Parry已经筹集了数万英镑,在途中,《舞动就舞》(Strictly) 明星Lauren Oakley也加入了他的行列。
“人们的响应之热烈令人惊叹。能与这些人同行绝对是一项荣誉,”他说。“这让你重新对人性产生信心。”
Parry决心完成这次步行,无论对其身体产生何种影响。
为了避暑,Parry每天凌晨 4.30am 起床,他经历了一路死胡同、走错路、荆棘和荨麻。
“我曾四肢着地爬过杂草丛生的田野,被荆棘割得体无完肤。有些地方糟糕到你需要一把砍刀才能穿过去。”在接受挑战前,Parry咨询了医生,医生告诉他,在他这个年龄进行如此剧烈的步行会给身体带来压力。
尽管如此,他仍选择继续,并表示:“我没有考虑后果。我知道如果我不这么做,人们就得不到帮助,所以在我心中没有其他选择。”
“我知道癌症让我疲惫,但这也是其中的一部分。我是一个相当坚决的人。正如我妻子所说,如果必须的话,我会四肢着地爬完。”
随着在威尔士的登山之行即将开始,Parry觉得最困难的部分还在后面。“我很吃力地爬坡,因为我的左肺无法充气,所以身体无法获得足够的氧气……但只要一步接一步走下去。现在没有什么能阻止我了。”
当他在TikTok上发布的第一个视频收到数千名癌症患者的响应时...
面对患者,帕里确定他想要提供帮助。
在他的视频中,帕里讨论了应对该疾病的方法,例如通过一些活动转移注意力并抑制焦虑;帕里通过绘画和素描来应对这些情绪。他说:“由于缺乏资金,安宁疗护院不得不关闭床位和病房,在这个社会里,我们竟然允许这种情况发生,这绝对令人不齿。”
“我会竭尽全力帮助那些遭受痛苦的人。这就是我唯一想做的;我只想帮助人们。”
麦基伦癌症支持中心 (Macmillan Cancer Support) 的关系筹款经理亚历克斯·豪 (Alex Howe) 表示:“约翰的决心简直令人惊叹。在应对自身癌症诊断的同时,承担如此规模的挑战,充分证明了他的韧性、勇气和慷慨。”
猜测你可以说这是我自己的“荷兰勇气” (Dutch courage) 版本。”
她一次较为难忘的约会始于一个令人侧目的点单。“我在酒吧点了一杯茶而不是一品脱啤酒,”她说。“这招来了几个奇怪的目光,但最后我们对此付之一笑——而且六个月后的今天,我们依然在一起。”
调查表明,对于许多人来说,这种仪式感与饮品本身一样重要。近三分之一的人将制作过程描述为——
现场音乐 创纪录之年
去年,Oasis 乐队重组,碧昂丝 (Beyoncé) 登陆托特纳姆,比莉·艾丽什 (Billie Eilish)、杜阿·利帕 (Dua Lipa) 和萨布丽娜·卡彭特 (Sabrina Carpenter) 连续数夜填满了各大体育馆。结果是,英国人重新爱上了现场音乐,为该行业带来了有史以来最大的财务红利。根据代表英国现场音乐行业的伞形组织 Live 公布的数据,英国人在现场音乐上的支出达到了创纪录的 £7.6 billion,比前一年增长了近 13%,比疫情前高出近 69%。这些数据表明,人们对现场娱乐的渴望不仅从新冠肺炎 (Covid-19) 中恢复了过来,而且在接二连三的巨星巡演推动下,开启了一个新的黄金时代,这些巡演让粉丝们不再计较为门票、酒店、周边商品和演出前饮品支付数百英镑。Oasis 的重组巡演成为了去年的文化事件,
数百万粉丝在网上疯狂抢票,希望在 16 年后首次看到利亚姆·加拉格尔 (Liam Gallagher) 和诺尔·加拉格尔 (Noel Gallagher) 同台,门票在几分钟内便被抢购一空。行业估计,他们的巡演在门票和周边商品方面创造了 £400 million 到 £460 million 之间的收入。他们并非孤例。Coldplay 乐队继续其打破纪录的世界巡演,碧昂丝在托特纳姆热刺球场举办的 Cowboy Carter 系列演出成为了年度最热门的门票之一,而比莉·艾丽什在伦敦 O2 体育馆连续六个夜晚的演出全部售罄。根据 Live 的数据,去年英国共举行了 232,000 场演出,比前一年增加约 1%,而前一年本身已是纪录。Live 首席执行官乔恩·柯林斯 (Jon Collins) 表示:“2025 年是现场音乐的又一个强劲年份,我们再次证明了触达英国各地的独特能力。”然而,许多小型场馆由于几乎没有空间通过提高票价来抵消上涨的成本,正陷入困境。该行业试图通过 Live 信托基金来弥补这一差距,将大型巡演的资金引导至基层音乐领域。该基金已分发了 £1.5 million,但即便如此,压力依然显现。尽管消费支出激增,但现场音乐行业的就业人数微降 0.1%,至 234,456 个岗位,这是行业在疫情后重新开放以来的首次年度下降。作为旨在降低酒店餐饮业和创意产业成本的广泛改革的一部分,政府部长们已宣布为酒吧、俱乐部和现场音乐场馆提供新的商业税率减免。
将喝茶视为一种平静的方式,而四分之一的人将其视为一种“低成本自我关怀”的形式。 Twinings 营销总监吉尔·克洛斯 (Gill Close) 表示:“一杯茶长期以来一直是家庭生活的一部分。年轻消费者正使其适应自己的需求。” 调茶大师布里奥妮·奥斯蒙德 (Bryony Osmond) 表示,Z 世代正在推动对轻盈调配茶的需求,而非传统的“早餐浓茶”。 这一转变反映了英国年轻人饮品习惯的更广泛变化。包括慈善组织 Drinkaware 在内的研究团体发现,Z 世代饮用酒精饮料的数量少于年长者,理由是出于健康和福祉的考虑。
Monday July 27 2026 | the times 新闻
就竞争性 行为 受到警告
此举是由于竞争性行为干扰了鸟类以及居民,后者可能会突然发现大群爱好者将车停在车道上或侵入其私人财产。 稀有鸟类的出现——被称为“巨型发现”(megas)——可能会吸引数百名配备望远镜、双筒镜、相机和其他装备的追鸟者(twitchers)前往私人土地,例如农田。 这份“观鸟者行为准则”由英国稀有鸟类委员会(评估稀有发现情况的机构)和业余爱好者网站 BirdGuides 共同发起。 该指南要求观鸟者不要过于接近鸟类及其栖息地,坚持走公共步道和道路,尽量减少讨论,并在接近稀有鸟类时缓慢行走。它还告知爱好者不要在手机上播放鸟鸣来吸引鸟类,特别是在繁殖季节,并且要给狗牵绳。 指南建议访问者不要将车停在车道、避车处或出入口,以便为应急服务部门和其他车辆留出通行空间,并远离私人财产。 法律禁止干扰稀有鸟类以及破坏具有特殊科学价值地点的栖息地,违者可被处以最高 £5,000 的罚款和六个月的监禁。 指南建议观鸟者成为其爱好的大使。“友好的回应、良好的观鸟体验或一个有帮助的答案,可能会激发人们对鸟类的兴趣,或增强对野生动物及其保护的认识,”指南称,并补充道:“请保持礼貌、尊重和自觉,享受你所看到的鸟类,并帮助传播我们这个精彩爱好的信息。”
Laurence Sleator
交通记者
由 14 个汽车品牌(包括菲亚特、标致和沃克斯豪尔)组成的 Stellantis 集团表示,对于比亚迪(BYD)和奇瑞(Chery)等公司进口产品所带来的“持续影响”持有“重大顾虑”。 根据零排放车辆 (ZEV) 强制指令,纯汽油和柴油新车的销售必须在 2030 年前停止,且所有新车必须在 2035. 年前全部实现电动化。制造商需提高电动汽车的销售比例,否则将面临罚款。今年的目标为 33%,明年将升至 38%。 在今年 4 月寄给交通大臣海蒂·亚历山大 (Heidi Alexander) 和时任商业大臣彼得·凯尔 (Peter Kyle) 的一封信中,Stellantis 英国公司集团董事总经理 Eurig Druce 警告称,该目标正对其业务造成“无法忍受的商业影响”。 他表示,今年第一季度销售的新电动汽车比例为
交通
挥汗如雨 新闻主播和播音员 索菲·罗沃斯 (Sophie Raworth) 在完成一项跨越意大利阿尔卑斯山的 80 英里、为期四天的耐力跑后。在此期间,她看到了土拨鼠、北山羊和金雕。“伟大的团队,难以置信的经历,”她说道。
零排放车辆 (ZEV) 强制指令的目标“无法实现,且与英国消费者的采用水平不一致”。 这封由《快速充电》(The Fast Charge) 通讯通过信息自由请求披露的信函补充道,政府“欢迎可能获得巨额补贴的中国产品进入英国”的政策正使这一挑战“进一步恶化”。 到今年为止,具有竞争力的中国品牌占据了新注册 ZEV 的近五分之一。混合动力车型,例如外观与路虎相似的 Jaecoo 7,正受到欢迎。 与欧盟和美国不同,英国不对中国进口汽车征收额外关税。 根据汽车制造商和贸易协会 (SMMT) 的数据,去年在英国销售的中国品牌车辆超过 196,000 辆,是 2024 年销售额 96,000 辆的两倍。 今年,政府将审查该指令所设定的目标。有报道称,在行业以及担心制造业失业的工会的压力下,该目标将被削弱。 今年 4 月,宝马 (BMW)、博世 (Bosch)、福特 (Ford) 和日产 (Nissan) 给政府的一封联合信函要求调整指令的轨迹。这些公司表示,目前的指标“过于严苛”,且忽略了合规成本。 “作为在英国拥有重大业务、直接雇佣超过 30,000 人、在过去十年中投资超过 £3 十亿 并在整个供应链中支持数千个就业岗位的公司,我们共同提出了关于紧迫改革需求的共同观点,”这些公司在信中写道。
迈克·霍斯 (Mike Hawes) 给交通部长的信中表示,该指令意味着行业不得不维持“重大且不可持续的激励措施”以驱动需求。 电动汽车行业首席执行官 珍妮·巴克利 (Ginny Buckley) 认为,中国进口产品(如广受欢迎的比亚迪海豹 BYD Seal)正使挑战性的局面变得更糟。 (下方为汽车制造商告知部长海蒂·亚历山大 Heidi Alexander 的内容)
“不符合板球精神”
Amelia Stout
卡德纳姆板球俱乐部 (Cadnam Cricket Club) 寻求扩建其亭阁,以提供女性、儿童和残障人士的更衣室和洗手间设施,并实施球场改进,包括铺设一块人工草坪。 然而,这些计划被平民描述为“令人震惊”。 平民防御协会 (Commoners Defence Association) 主席安德鲁·帕里-诺顿 (Andrew Parry-Norton) 表示:“卡德纳姆板球俱乐部一直是一家小型的新森林板球俱乐部,但现在他们的野心似乎变得大得多。” “这里不是合适的位置,而且会损害森林——但俱乐部似乎决定完全不顾一切地强行推进。” 自该俱乐部拒绝在秋季向放牧牲畜开放球场以来,便一直与平民处于对立状态。 俱乐部主席保罗·戈弗里 (Paul Godfrey) 表示,球场用地从未被用于放牧,实际上在 20 世纪 50 年代被俱乐部清理之前,那里一直是存放建筑材料的废地。他补充道:“我知道共有权 (commoning) 是森林的重要组成部分,但人们拥有体育运动机会同样重要。虽然我尊重这里一直有小马,但我们也一直在这里——我们也是森林的一部分。” 扩建计划已提交给新森林国家公园管理局,并得到了教区议会和英格兰自然环境署 (Natural England) 的认可,后者表示这些计划不太可能对该地区产生任何重大影响。球道的计划在 2023, 获得了有条件许可,俱乐部打算在今年夏天安装。
汽车购买网站 Electrifying.com 并不认同,并表示自从中国汽车进入市场以来,买家才是“最大的赢家”。 “中国品牌让电动汽车变得更实惠、更普及,为驾驶者提供了更多选择,”她说道。“回归到肮脏的汽油和柴油技术只会让情况变得更糟。英国在汽车制造方面的吸引力将降低,我们在面对中国的竞争时会进一步落后。” 交通部表示: “我们仍然致力于在 2035 年前逐步停止所有新的非零排放汽车和面包车的销售。 “英国电动汽车市场强劲且在增长——今年 6 月的销量比去年同期增长了 35%——我们正通过 £2 billion 的电动汽车补贴计划支持制造商,这正在刺激销售并帮助更多驾驶者转向电动汽车。” Stellantis 的一名发言人表示:“目前的汽车经营环境充满挑战,我们已经向政府进行了清晰且客观的说明。”
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Trevor Phillips
@trevorptweets
新领导人总是承诺变革。但有些人的说服力不如其他人。基尔·斯塔默 (Keir Starmer) 在 2024 年 7 月担任首相后的首次演讲中谈到了“牺牲……疲惫……希望的流逝”。这在政治上相当于屹耳 (Eeyore) 的问候语:“早安,噗噗熊。如果这是一个美好的早晨的话。我对此表示怀疑。如果下雨了,别怪我。” 相比之下,安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 在上周五开启他的 No 10 North 时,宣布那是他人生中最美好的一天。如果他穿上一件橙黑相间的条纹上衣,在弹簧上蹦蹦跳跳,并宣布:“安迪最美妙的一点,就是安迪本身就是个美妙的人”,那么英国这位新领导人简直不能比提格 (Tigger) 更加活泼了。 他的自信毋庸置疑。在过去三年中,我对包括这两位在内的资深政治家进行了 400 多个采访,我认为英国人民开始反感斯塔默的一个原因,是他巧妙地传递出一种信号:如果不加干涉,英国人天生就是需要用法律来约束的偏见者和无赖。这并非事实,但斯塔默梦中的国家和人民在很大程度上仅存在于联合国官僚机构的法律虚构之中。杰里米·科尔宾 (Jeremy Corbyn)、莉兹·特拉斯 (Liz Truss)、鲍里斯·约翰逊 (Boris Johnson),甚至里希·苏纳克 (Rishi Sunak),似乎都成了强加在许多人成长过程中所熟悉的两个政党之上的异物。奈杰尔·法拉奇 (Nigel Farage)
显然更倾向于一个看起来和听起来都像 1930 年代英国乡村、且增加了加密货币的英国,这在少数人看来可能很有吸引力,但英国的大部分地区已经告别了那个时代。 另一方面,伯纳姆和 凯米·巴德诺克 (Kemi Badenoch) 对如今的英国人民展现出了真正的热情,即便他们存在缺陷,即便两人在未来的方向上存在分歧。安迪和凯米——人们现在开始用他们的名字来称呼他们——看起来像是他们所属阵营历史主流的延伸。 但仅仅看起来和听起来正确是不够的。伯纳姆知道他需要做更多工作来抵御来自改革党 (Reform) 的威胁。我认为他做得还不错。 首先,他天生就是个鼓舞人心且讨好大众的人。对能源账单进行小规模但显眼的削减、限制公交票价以及酒吧的商业税,虽然不能改变世界,但它们确实...
低调且高效地 将事情办成的人
营造出一种势头感。 其次,他避免了身份政治中那种训诫式的语气。在瑞秋·里夫斯 (Rachel Reeves) 的辞职信中,她再次提到自己曾是首位女性财政大臣,而大卫·拉米 (David Lammy) 则提到自己是首位黑人副首相。伯纳姆则克制地没有张扬地提及他的国防大臣是同性恋,内政大臣是穆斯林,或外交大臣是犹太人这一事实。 第三,他对朋友和敌人一样残酷。对于斯塔默 (Starmer) 的忠诚者来说,上周一绝非快乐之日。这不是一次内阁洗牌,而是一次政权更迭。到午餐时间,已有 11 位内阁部长被解职。但对于他自己的亲信来说,同样有一个警告:没有人仅仅因为身在获胜团队就能获得职位。他们必须在为公众而非为政党提供成果方面展现出高效。
公众希望减少移民,减少福利支出,增加国防开支。公众对于不计成本地实现净零排放已失去了热情。而从整体上讲,工党想要的是相反的结果。 因此,在继续留任内政部的沙巴娜·马哈茂德 (Shabana Mahmood)、负责福利与养老金的帕特·麦克法登 (Pat McFadden) 以及现任国防部长的韦斯·斯特里京 (Wes Streeting) 身上,他选择了那些以愿意对抗党内激进分子而著称的部长。他将埃德·米利班德 (Ed Miliband) 从能源事务中撤职,并看来准备批准北海的石油和天然气生产许可证。 另一个不被关注的侧向调动是将关键的社会护理事务交给赫尔议员戴安娜·约翰逊女爵士 (Dame Diana Johnson),她已建立起一个低调高效、务实、不搞派系、能将事情办成且正符合伯纳姆器重之类型的运营商名声。
她领导的围绕受感染血液丑闻的运动,促成了由布莱恩·朗斯塔夫爵士 (Sir Brian Langstaff) 领导的一次具有里程碑意义的调查,以及一项总额超过 £11 的补偿基金。伯纳姆无疑从中看到了他当年为希尔斯堡 (Hillsborough) 受难者家庭坚持追求正义的影子。 在他委以信任处理这些争议问题的四位部长中,没有一个人来自他的曼彻斯特圈子。愤世嫉俗者会嗤之以鼻地认为,这意味着如果他们失败了,所有人都可以被政治抛弃。而心态更宽广的人则会将此视为“大帐篷”政治,并赞誉伯纳姆是一位准备用职责来奖赏能力与勇气且能之领导者。我倾向于
路易丝·海格可以成为伯纳姆需要的那个协调人,效仿威利·怀特劳的风格
第二种解释。最后,伯纳姆最关键的政治任命是他高效的副手路易丝·海格 (Louise Haigh)。在之前的一篇专栏中,我建议玛格丽特·撒切尔 (Margaret Thatcher) 是正确的,即每位首相都需要一个“威利”;她的副手威廉·怀特劳 (William Whitelaw) 就像托尼·布莱尔 (Tony Blair) 拥有约翰·普雷斯科特 (John Prescott) 一样,充当幕后的劝说者、施压者和交易撮合者。 怀特劳承担了主持关键内阁委员会的重担,为老板把风,并在她即将犯错时提醒她。每个人都知道他不仅仅是一个传话筒——她在任何争端中都会支持他。他在 1987. 中风后退休。一些亲近的同事认为,如果怀特劳一直留在她身边,她可能永远不会开始那个最终终结其政治生涯的灾难性人头税实验。
伯纳姆找到了他的“威利”。海格在承认二十多岁时涉及一部手机的刑事犯罪后,辞去了交通部长的职务。但很少有人怀疑她的能力;她是进入内阁职级的最年轻女性。 人们将她与另一位来自北方的红发工党政治家进行了比较,那是唯一另一位曾担任过
想象过约翰·希利会成为财政大臣
第一任秘书的头衔:芭芭拉·卡斯尔 (Barbara Castle)。 我认为这些类比纯粹是表面上的。威尔逊给了卡斯尔一个非常具体且特殊的角色:推动那些他深知必要但在当时并不受欢迎的高调政策——例如强制系安全带和限制工会权力。卡斯尔服从了,并为此付出了代价。 另一方面,海格 (Haigh) 虽然显然厌恶公开露面,但她已经是这个国家的权力核心。正是她施加了在工党队伍中缺失十多年的纪律,并阻止了在伯纳姆 (Burnham) 崛起之前的泄密活动。只有极少数人甚至想象过约翰·希利 (John Healey) 成为财政大臣的可能性。 这一切意味着什么?这意味着那些——包括我在内——曾暗示由工党和保守党代表的传统政治在过去十年中一直处于退却状态的人可能错了。这仅仅是一个暗示,即巴德诺克 (Badenoch) 和伯纳姆 (Burnham) 两人可能已经开始为我们以往的做事方式,开辟一条回归国家信任的陡峭且狭窄的小径。
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亚历克斯·马西 (Alex Massie)
@alexmassie
安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 上任后的头几天,对于我们中的一些人来说是一次令人不安的经历。几乎没有一天是不发布新政策公告的,但从真正的北方视角来看,这是一部许多人都依稀记得看过之前的电影。 我想起尼古拉·斯特鲁根 (Nicola Sturgeon) 宣布她将消除苏格兰无家可归者时的情景,我也记得苏格兰民族党 (SNP) 承诺要彻底改革社会护理并建立国家护理服务的时候。这两件事实际上都没有实现,尽管我们必须承认伯纳姆可能会在斯特鲁根失败的地方获得成功,但事实依然是,伯纳姆主义 (Burnhamism) 所传递的氛围和态度,已经让人们感觉像是在经历苏格兰选民在过去 20 年里一直享受——或忍受——的那种基于氛围和态度的政治。那是自苏格兰民族党 (SNP) 窃取了工党的衣裳并成为苏格兰天然的执政党以来就存在的。 苏格兰民族党 (SNP) 的成功基于迎合大众的民粹主义,并由这样一个事实提供缓冲:总会有另一个人在另一个地方承担最终的账单。这也是工党的舒适区,但新首相可能会发现,从地区权力中心跃升至国家公职的这一步要困难得多。
禁果总是 味道极其 诱人
在我看来,桑葚是世界上最好的水果。它们强烈的麝香气息与任何其他浆果都截然不同。更令人向往的是,它们太脆弱而无法运输,因此即便在最高档的蔬菜水果店,我也从未见过。你必须能接触到桑树才行。
我们很幸运:我们有不错的邻居,他们的树结出的果实多到吃不完,所以我通常能满足这种渴望,但今年他们外出度假数周。他们的桑葚正被那些可憎的、贪婪的肥鸽子收割,鸽子们吃得撑胀,然后故意在我的花园里留下紫色粪便。
我尝试潜入邻居的花园——得到了他们的许可,但没有结果。我借来的梯子够不到树,格栅开始摇晃,而我的女儿在讲述关于那些被遗弃的人们的故事时分散了我的注意力。
比他想象的更伟大、更艰难。在能源价格或款待业商业税率方面采取的微小象征性姿态仅仅如此而已:这些微小的示意在理论上提供的帮助多于实际操作。
担任大曼彻斯特市市长在某种程度上就像是政治中的一种“作弊码”。每项积极的发展都是你的功劳,而每个问题都是别人的错。伯纳姆通过将自己和他的城市定义为南方地区的对立面来建立了名声。他是“我们北方的同类”,没有被任何与脱离群众、遥远的威斯敏斯特权贵阶层相关的关系所玷污——而后者在不积极地敌视北方利益时,也永远对此漠不关心。
这种现象对于我们这些身处不列颠北部的人来说并不陌生。伦敦,这个巨大的帝国吸血鱿鱼,是一个容易被攻击的目标,尽管尴尬的是,正是伦敦的税收在补贴不列颠的其他地区。经济重新平衡确实有其必要性,而更大规模的权力下放或许能在其中发挥作用,但认为这应该以牺牲伦敦为代价的想法,很可能会被证明是一个代价昂贵的错误。
无论如何,伯纳姆想要通过定义自己与中心的对立来塑造形象,这种做法很可能很快就会失效。同样,这就是地方政治家与国家政治家之间的区别。苏格兰民族党(SNP)在这种博弈中比
从梯子上掉下来后瘫痪的人。所以我只能满足于怒视那些鸽子,并梦想着像汤姆·莱勒(Tom Lehrer)那样地毒死它们,用它们可怕的小尸体来给我的花坛施肥。
但这个周末,慷慨的大自然可怜了我。我和姐姐一起去参观了英格兰最美丽的景观之一——东萨塞克斯郡的大迪克斯特花园(Great Dixter)。那里有一棵我见过的最大的桑树,果实累累,将果实——与海水不同,这些果实确实是酒红色的——掉落在下方的石头上。让它们浪费掉似乎很可惜,于是我们采摘、品尝,离开时双手通红,衣服被染污,肚子却吃得很饱。
机器人战争
如果还需要更多证据来证明《布里安的人生》(Life of Brian)是有史以来最伟大的政治哲学作品,埃隆·马斯克(Elon Musk)接受《经济学人》编辑赞妮·明顿-贝多斯(Zanny Minton Beddoes)采访的片段就足以提供证明。当马斯克描述由 AI 控制的未来的光明前景时,明顿-贝多斯询问这如何能与他去年表达的观点相一致,即当时他认为 killer robots(杀手机器人)消灭人类的概率在 10 到 20 per cent 之间。马斯克说:“我的哲学结论是,看向光明的一面。”
敏锐的观察者可能会注意到,自去年以来情况发生了变化。马斯克让他的 AI 公司 Space X 上市,而其估值——幸运的是,正在下跌——取决于各国政府对 AI 给人类带来的后果持有积极看法。然而,马斯克为乐观情绪提供的依据,并不比《布里安的人生》的最后一幕更有力,在那一幕中,一排接一排被钉在十字架上的受难者齐声合唱道:“永远看向生活光明的一面。”
安迪的小食 W
伯纳姆更能有效地掌控局面。他们享有任何英格兰政治家都被否决的结构性优势。
也就是说,苏格兰民族主义者可以永远为他们认为的苏格兰利益“挺身而出”,而一个仅代表兰开斯特地区、负责在全英格兰利益下行政的人物则无法做到这一点。在苏格兰开展的身份政治,其层次比英格兰的工党政治家所能触及的更高且更宽。苏格兰民族党可以同时身兼执政党与反对党,但伯纳姆已经不再拥有这个选项。
然而多年来,许多工党温和左翼的支持者一直带着某种羡慕看向北方的苏格兰。在那里,他们看到一个本科生无需负担学费、医疗处方药免费且年轻人和老年人乘坐巴士免费的国家。苏格兰还是一个福利供应明显比英格兰或威尔士更慷慨的地方。所有这一切构成了苏格兰民族党喜欢称之为的“苏格兰独特的社会契约”。难怪一些工党支持者在看到这一切后,会好奇为什么在王国的其他地方不能拥有类似的东西。
苏格兰民族党不愿承认的肮脏秘密是,这种规模的加里东(Caledonian)慷慨之所以可行,是因为其大部分资金来自于伦敦和英格兰东南部通过财政转移支付提供的资金。苏格兰的特殊之处在于,它是不列颠的一个相对富裕的地区,却接收了与其作为极贫困地区相匹配的资金。苏格兰内部及为其提供的公共支出比其他地区高出约 25 per cent。
温斯顿·丘吉尔在首次向议会发表讲话时,为他的政府奠定了基调:“我能提供的只有血汗、劳苦、眼泪和汗水。” 玛格丽特·撒切尔在唐宁街的台阶上引用了圣方济各的格言。而安迪·伯纳姆在就任首相之际,国家虽然不像 1940 年那样显然处于危险之中,但其氛围与 1979 年颇为相似;他却在一家酒吧里与约翰·希利拍了一段视频,讨论他们最喜欢的酒吧小吃。
这就是一个在关键时刻接管了 70 million 人的领导者,他没有告诉国民他们正处于经济灾难的边缘,而是在发放补贴,并与财政大臣争论是选 Scampi Fries(炸大虾片)还是炸猪皮。也许他是在为未来的痛苦做铺垫,让人们心理适应。也许这是为了提前大选而发起的竞选活动。或者,也许他真的如此轻率。
细节之眼
我有了个新偶像——艾米莉·威尔逊,她翻译的《奥德赛》版本启发了克里斯托弗·诺兰。我听了一场冗长且深思熟虑的采访,她在其中详细讨论了如何选择正确的词汇来传达“polytropos”的丰富含义,这个词在第一句中被用来描述奥德修斯。字面意思是“多转”。其他人选择了“足智多谋”和“多方手段”。她选择了“复杂”,她以一个完美主义者的不满语气说,除了所有其他可能性之外,这是最糟糕的选择。也许是因为当今的公共生活充满了乏味的概括,所以我如此崇拜一种致力于精准和细微差别的生活。
(注:此部分接续前文关于苏格兰与英格兰支出的对比分析)
人均支出高于英格兰,总计占 GDP 的 52 per cent。相比之下,整个英国的公共支出相当于 GDP 的 46 per cent。
因此,即便苏格兰模式被认为是有吸引力的,对英格兰来说也显然不可行。要实现这样的结果,需要在整体税收负担已经处于 60 年多来最高水平的时候,大幅增加税收,而这在现实中根本不可行。
政治往往充满了讽刺,但最讽刺的现实莫过于:苏格兰民族党(SNP)的政策议程之所以可行,恰恰是因为那些民族主义者所鄙视并旨在拆除的宪政架构。苏格兰独立每年将导致至少 £10 billion 的税收增加或支出削减。为了提供一个有用的参考,这相当于给整个联合王国带来 £100 billion 的预算紧缩。这无疑是一笔巨额资金。
财政现实是那些依赖“感觉”的政治家触礁的礁石。伯纳姆目前正享受着一种好感度的反弹,但这更多是因为他不是基尔·斯塔默,而不是因为他是安迪·伯纳姆。财务上的危机很快就会到来。
到那时,人们将清楚地看到,挑选“赢家”必然意味着也要选择“输家”。伯纳姆迄今为止一直受益于自己是曼彻斯特民族主义者的身份,但唐宁街是一个毫不留情的地方,他很快会像他的前任们一样发现,他的不幸没有任何人可以责怪——而寻求真正的北方答案也无法为他提供所需的解决办法。
让我国恢复 海洋秩序 Elisabeth Braw
如今的海洋极其混乱。这不仅仅是指霍尔穆兹海峡和俄罗斯的影子舰队,还包括中国在南海破坏海事准则的行为,以及胡塞武装对船只的袭击,还有美国单方面挖掘深海矿产的尝试。必须有人负责恢复海洋秩序。英国正是最适合承担此任的国家。“统率群波,不列颠!不列颠,统率群波!”(Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves!)将再次成为“逍彼之夜”(Last Night of the Proms)音乐会上慷慨激昂的副歌,但我敢打赌,很少有观众会想到全球海事秩序。这可以理解,但依然令人遗憾,因为海洋正处于危机之中。
几代以来,不守规矩的水手将废物倾倒入海,但近年来其他违规行为也日益增加。中国在官方属于其他国家的南海部分海域建造岛屿,并习惯性地在那里欺压其他国家的船只。俄罗斯系统性地利用其影子舰队出口受制裁石油,在明知风险的情况下,让英国和其他沿海国家面临不适航船舶的威胁,这些船舶甚至可能蓄意造成伤害。事实上,如今俄罗斯海军在护送其中一些船只。上周,俄罗斯海军甚至在普利茅斯海岸附近进行了实弹演习。这虽然不严格违法,但非常失礼——这种不请自来的访问是任何国家都厌恶的。
至于我们的朋友美国,它正在开启一场将加剧海事混乱的冒险。去年春天,特朗普总统允许美国公司在国际海域的深海床开采矿物,这违反了《联合国海洋法公约》(Unclos)。虽然美国尚未批准该公约,但长期以来一直遵守该公约。而在深海采矿问题上,美国正公然违背这一至关重要的条约。当大国如此行事时,小国为什么还要在意海洋秩序?因为如果没有秩序,国民经济将受损,海洋生态也将受影响。
几个世纪以来,各国一直试图建立这种秩序,并在近几十年取得了成功。而现在,这种秩序正在瓦解。有一个国家可以引领世界恢复秩序:那就是英国。英国曾是世界领先的海员之国,而伦敦至今仍是全球海事中心。更重要的是,英国在国际外交中是值得信赖的对话者,并且遵守其签署的条约。英国处于绝佳位置,可以集结一个致力于海洋秩序的国家联盟。一旦实现,世界将发现几乎所有国家都倾向于秩序。
不列颠,请恢复对波涛的治理!
修复我们的监狱应成为首要任务 刑事与司法系统长期以来一直是政治投机主义的牺牲品——公众信心低迷也就不足为奇了
P
Libby Purves
@lib_thinks
监狱问题是一项紧急事务。 虽然对于一个新成立的政府来说,这并非唯一事项,但却尤为紧迫。两年前,基尔·斯塔默爵士似乎意识到了这一点,他任命了一位真正了解监狱情况并成功雇用数百名前囚犯的部长——蒂姆森勋爵(Lord Timpson)。 当领导层剧变导致他辞职时(令人深感遗憾),这位专家部长能够指出他在任期间所取得的进步。自残率、暴力行为以及对工作人员的袭击率均有所下降;被释放后无处可去的男性人数有所减少。但我们的监狱依然处于 97% 的容量状态,并且很可能在数月内在物理空间上达到饱和,因此,复苏的萌芽与必要但令公众不安的提前释放问题并行不悖。 如果能看到蒂姆森回归将是件好事,但无论是否会发生,监狱和缓刑方面仍有紧急工作需要完成。我对安迪·伯纳姆上周任命的凯瑟琳·麦金奈尔(Catherine McKinnell)一无所知,但她很难声称拥有其前任在数十年接触并改造前囚犯过程中所积累的那种深刻且清醒的系统认知。 令人震惊的是,致敬词称他为“15 年来任职时间最长的监狱部长”。这充分说明了公职人员的频繁更替,以及我们政治中轻率的裙带关系和投机主义之弊端。大卫·卡梅伦和特蕾莎·梅每人都更换了三名监狱部长,鲍里斯·约翰逊则更换了四名。利兹·特拉斯和里希·苏纳克又进行了进一步的变动。而我们竟然还在纳闷,为什么司法系统从未得到应有的关注。或者说,在蒂姆森出现之前一直没有得到关注。 与此同时,出现了两件事。其一是令人好奇的事实:尽管暴力犯罪有所下降,但我们送入监狱的人数却比 30 年前更多。按人口人头计算,我们监禁的人数是大多数欧洲国家的两倍。这在一定程度上解释了目前的紧急状态,以及一名新手首相目前焦虑地暂停执行的提前释放计划。 刑事司法系统的另一个压力点是网络回声室新闻、活动和宣传的推进。我记得曾经有一段时间,判处监禁通常被视为一个结论,是真实犯罪传奇的最后一页。作案者被关起来,服刑。总之是件好事。这里没什么可看的。这虽然导致监狱福利被忽视,但至少它是一个句号。法院的决定也很少在公开场合被质疑:法官和陪审团履行职责,记者进行报道,判决下达,游戏结束。 囚犯教育和艺术曾是被认可的良好事业,尽管人们对此心存疑虑:支持者冒着被斥为“心软的滥情者”的风险。当我在两大政党的党代会上谈论监狱艺术时,它被认为是
经常将受害者的声音 当作柴薪
那些对此不屑一顾的工党议员。 保守党(或许是受到了乔纳森·艾特肯的影响)似乎稍微更愿意接受一些。 如今在焦虑时代,面对海量未经筛选的故事,公众经常在量刑和监禁问题上被煽动起愤怒之情。最近,关于两名被判定强奸两起案件的青少年男孩被免于入狱以避免“不必要的刑事化”而引发了骚动;此外还有几起来自厌女文化背景的寻求庇护者因性骚扰而被免除监禁的案例。还有肖恩·麦肯纳,
他在一个营地强奸了一名儿童,但仅被判处三年的社区偿还服务,因为他现在患有亨廷顿舞蹈病这种脑部疾病,在监狱中无法得到监管。 此外,人们对提前释放也感到愤怒,这不仅来自警员安德鲁·哈珀的家人,还来自许多家庭暴力和强奸的受害者,他们现在面临着攻击者在服刑三分之一后就获释的风险。 任何不负责任的活动人士都可以将受害者悲伤的声音当作柴薪,在热衷于此的媒体煽动下,受害者在哀悼时——至少在一段时间内,这是可以理解的——希望对伤害他们的人施以严厉的惩罚。 最煽动情绪的披露是,索特波特儿童杀手阿克塞尔·鲁达库巴纳已被转移到布罗德摩尔精神病院。 在 TikTok 和 X 上的一段令人不齿的视频中,改革党的齐亚·尤苏夫——这位该党的“影子内政大臣”,上帝保佑我们——声称对受害者家属深表同情,同时幸灾乐祸地宣布,这次转移表明英国的司法制度已经崩溃。他展示了布罗德摩尔医院带有“休闲中心”风格的舒适座椅等伪装恐怖的图片,愉快地利用受害者家属的悲痛和纳税人的成本来博取关注。他引导人们轻易地假设鲁达库巴纳在某种程度上在作弊:伪装病情,欺骗经验丰富的精神病学家以钻系统漏洞,从而坐到那些舒适的椅子上。
受害者的声音很重要。 我们在本世纪新引入的 VPS(受害者个人陈述)中承认了这一点。在判决后,其目的是为了阐明所造成的伤害并提供一定的心理慰藉。但至关重要的是,它不能要求特定的判刑。那是法院的工作:情感很重要,但它不是证据。法律设有上诉程序——在福丁桥青少年强奸犯的案例中,这增加了他们的刑期——但为了文明的利益,我们必须远离牛仔式的复仇或沙里亚法中受害者至上的原始主义。我们将惩罚的职责交给法律。对于受苦的人来说,这可能显得残酷,有时司法确实会出现裂痕。但它是安全与秩序的基石。 看看尤苏夫对鲁达库巴纳那次可怕的愤怒抨击,如果这样的傻瓜掌握权力会发生什么。他们会因为一时的心血来之而轻率地忽略一个世纪以来关于《精神健康法》谨慎、专业的演变,仅仅是为了取悦因罕见的暴行而处于震惊中的公众,并让自己看起来很强硬。他们会轻率地否认精神障碍的人类现实,并谴责监狱狱警在压力巨大的日常工作中去应对被诊断为具有精神病危险的囚犯。 利用无辜的悲伤和公众的愤怒并不是民主。这是对法治的威胁,从而是对我们所有人的威胁。
先生,关于“北方 10 号”的回复(信件,7 月 25 日)并未考虑到大曼彻斯特地区的经济增长和地理位置。那种戴平顶帽、穿木鞋、养赛鸽的形象早已消失,我们并不是 LS Lowry 绘画中的角色。曼彻斯特对英国的历史、文化和经济贡献不应被低估。它是伦敦以外增长最快的城市区域经济体,在超过 10 年的时间里,年经济增长率维持在 3.1%。 约翰·菲茨杰拉尔德 (John Fitzgerald) 曼彻斯特,德罗尔斯登 (Droylsden, Manchester)
先生,既然 安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 在两个中心运作他的政府,这是否意味着在曼彻斯特和伦敦两地工作的国会议员除了在选区有住所外,还需要两处住所?当然,还会产生铁路票价的报销申请。 瓦内莎·米切尔 (Vanessa Mitchell) 白金汉郡,卡尔弗顿 (Calverton, Bucks)
先生,北方是否有供周末使用的“北区契克斯”?它在哪里? 斯蒂芬·哈默顿 (Stephen Hammerton) 巴斯 (Bath)
先生, 安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 确实是一个平民之友。通过建立“北方 10 号”,他就像全国各地的上班族一样,成功地制造了一个可以在周五居家办公的伪理由。 塞缪尔·凯西 (Samuel Casey) 伦敦 SW6
先生,彼得·斯特格尔斯 (Peter Steggles)(信件,7 月 25 日)为什么认为赛鸽是一种典型的北方消遣?伊丽莎白女王在桑德灵厄姆养过鸽子,而皇家赛鸽协会的总部设在格洛斯特郡。 彼得·J·罗宾逊 (Peter J Robinson) 西约克郡,韦克菲尔德 (Wakefield, W Yorks)
6 在一篇标题和一篇社论中,我们称每位移民护理工作者随行携带多达 15 名家庭成员(新闻,评论,7 月 7 日)。这是不正确的。15 比 1 的比例是指 2025-26 年度,喀麦隆护理工作者的新签证批准数与所有已在英国的喀麦隆护理工作者家庭成员签证批准数的比率。加纳、孟加拉国和印度的人员情况亦然。护理工作者的新签证批准(他们根本不允许携带任何受养人)与已在英国的护理工作者家庭成员获发的签证之间没有联系。
《泰晤士报》严肃对待有关编辑内容的投诉。我们致力于遵守独立新闻标准组织 (“IPSO”) 的规章制度以及 IPSO 强制执行的《编辑实操守则》。 更正或澄清请求请发送电子邮件至 feedback@thetimes.co.uk 或邮寄至 Feedback, The Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF
先生,关于英国可再生能源风险的报道(《净零风险导致停电》,7月 25日)与一张照片并列放置,照片中法国西南部失控的火灾导致天空呈血橙色。持续使用化石燃料所带来的威胁及其与气候崩溃的联系是关乎生存的。与可再生能源相比,不可再生能源带来的危险要大得多。 安德鲁·戴维斯博士 (Dr Andrew Davis) 牛津郡,比斯特 (Bicester, Oxon)
先生,没有人应该暗示净零排放不应受到批评。转型的成本、速度和实际操作确实值得严格审查。你们的分析讨论了化石燃料在满足电力需求方面的“可靠性”,却未承认继续依赖它们的日益增长的风险。可靠性不仅取决于灯光是否保持亮起,还取决于气候是否依然宜居。 约翰·穆伦 (John Mullen) 伦敦 N4
先生,电网的问题并非由向净零排放的转型引起。它们是由
节约用水 安装灰水系统,以减轻饮用水供应的压力。 约翰·阿什顿博士 (Dr John Ashton) 利物浦,伍尔顿 (Woolton, Liverpool)
先生,托尼·琼斯 (Tony Jones) 建议在“干旱体制”下减少冲洗厕所的频率(信件,7月 25日),这混淆了用水量与水消费量。大多数家庭用水并未丢失。经过处理后,这些水会回流到河流中,通常成为下游另一个社区的用水来源。因此,减少家庭需求也会减少这些回流水。同样地,许多泄漏的水最终会补充地下水,而非消失。英国的水资源挑战不在于如何少用水,而在于如何在正确的时间和地点对其进行管理。 梅尔文·凯 (Melvyn Kay) 水资源管理顾问;北安普者郡,拉什登 (Rushden, Northants)
先生,托尼·琼斯提出了一个重要问题,这可能为我们带来相当于建设许多新水库的收益。我指的是利用屋顶收集的灰水进行洗浴和冲洗厕所,以代替浪费饮用水质的水。法国人在 19 世纪就发现了双重供水系统的价值。当然,所有新建筑应立即被要求
剧作家 遭到审查
摘自《泰晤士报》1926年7月27日
昨晚,在都会酒店举行的一场晚宴上,伯纳德·肖先生在庆祝其 70 岁生日之际,受邀成为议会工党成员的宾客。拉姆齐·麦克唐纳议员主持了会议,并为肖先生的健康举杯。他表示,他们认为在这样一个场合,全国人民都希望在当晚听到肖先生的发言,但遗憾的是,决定此类事务的并非英国广播公司,而是政府。由于政府的心胸狭隘且不能——
【注:此处文本中断,随后跳转至能源讨论】
转型管理不善,以及对底层基础设施数十年来的投资不足,特别是缺乏对能够管理可再生能源固有输出波动的电网的投资。其他国家进行了投资,而我们没有。例如,德国能够整合更多样化的能源发电来源,且面临我们今年夏天这类问题的风险要低得多。
然而,并非一切都已失去:用一个恰当的净零隐喻来说,种一棵树最好的时间是 20 年前;其次最好的时间就是现在。智能电网将使我们能够在需求高峰期停止汽车充电(甚至在此时将电量回馈至电网),同时降低连接新型小规模能源(如插件式太阳能)的风险。
查尔斯·布拉德福德 多塞特郡,波维顿
先生,关于罗斯班克 (Rosebank) 油田的法律处理方式揭露了英国气候政策中一个严重的矛盾。罗斯班克最初的批准被撤销,是因为环境评估未将最终开采石油和天然气时产生的排放量纳入其中。
先生,几十年来,我一直将尿液排在堆肥堆上;它富含氮元素,因此能改善堆肥并节约用水。请把便桶带回来吧。
莱斯尔·赖德 坎布里亚郡,西莫兰兰-阿普尔比
先生,在加勒比地区,每个洗手间都贴着一个告示:“若是黄色,随它自然 —— 若是棕色,立刻冲掉。”
苏尼尔·阿明 伦敦 NW9
先生,弗雷泽·尼尔森声称首相利用脱欧权力降低了电力的增值税(见 7 月 25 日《斯塔默有一个好故事,但那是伯纳姆要讲述的故事》)。伯纳姆仅在大不列颠地区拥有该权力,而在北爱尔兰则没有。由于温莎框架以及之前由前任保守党政府让步的北爱尔兰议定书,任何英国首相或议会都无法如此操作。
政客们倾向于忽视我们整个国家的整体需求。 保罗·克纳根 剑桥郡,纳辛顿
先生,乡村郡县的巴士预算非常匮乏(见 7 月 23 日《伯纳姆突袭气候项目资金以支付 £2 巴士票价上限》)。服务、票价和信息需要统一在一个网络之下,而不是让十几个运营商碎片化地维持着仅靠补贴生存的孤立线路。乡村地区的人们往往无法通过巴士前往工作地点、就医、购物或拜访朋友。在什罗普郡——那里羊比人多——我们需要一个“羊群网络”,以实现集成巴士网络为曼彻斯特等城市带来的变革。 安迪·博丁顿 什罗普郡,卢德洛
致《泰晤士报》的信件必须为独家提供。请附上详细地址和白天的联系电话。
衡量人们心中的想法。肖先生那一晚并没有被广播。 肖先生说,最令他感到不安的是,公众一直将他视为一名伟人。人们都知道他在工作中是个极其聪明的人,但他在气质上并没有那种“伟人”的感觉。 提到那一晚他的演讲没有被广播这一事实,肖先生继续说道,除了他被公认为陛下反对党的支持者之外,没有人反对他。因此,政府在纯真地认为,所有反对党的支持者都应当被压制。他们在他的案例中采取了否认言论自由这一非常严重的步骤,而这种情况在目前许多其他案例中可能也会被否认。言论自由的权利并不是在公共场合宣称多佛路上没有里程碑的权利,而是……
争议性地表达观点的权利——这正是所有议会政府的基础。(掌声。) 在他开始时,工党与自由主义和激进主义相结合。随后,工党明确表示,必须要做的是使其成为一个宪制政党。这就是为什么现政府如此害怕工党,而远胜于害怕那些优秀的旧共和激进主义者的原因。(笑声。) 现政府一直在干涉资本主义,并制定各种破坏其自身制度的规定。如果私有财产妨碍了分配,那么私有财产就必须消失。他们必须认真研究一套政府治理技术,以便在时机成熟时做好准备。
衡量燃料的碳排放量。然而,当相同的燃料从挪威、美国或中东进口时,并不需要进行等同的评估。 如果需求保持不变,限制国内生产并不能消除排放。它仅仅是将生产、投资、就业和税收转移到海外,同时增加了对进口的依赖,并可能增加运输过程中的排放。然而,这并不是反对减少化石燃料使用的论点。英国必须通过电气化、提高能源效率和采用更清洁的替代方案来减少需求。 蒂姆·威廉姆斯 阿伯丁
先生,追求净零排放“冒着停电和电费上涨的风险”,这并不令人意外。显然,可再生能源无法提供能源安全。政府需要迅速采取行动,利用我们的北海天然气建设更多燃气电站,同时投资于大规模且经过验证的核电站。两者都能提供可靠的电力,而这是任何成功经济体的关键组成部分。 伊恩·罗斯 伦敦 SE25
先生,迈克·阿瑟顿 (Mike Atherton) 关于明年夏天 骨灰杯 (Ashes) 系列赛的文章(《北方的骨灰杯之轻视是不公平的,且背弃了这项运动的传承》,7月 24日)完全正确。南安普顿不具备海丁利 (Headingley) 或老特拉福德 (Old Trafford) 那样的传统或氛围。英格兰和威尔士板球委员会 (ECB) 怎么能不在英格兰板球的核心地带举办一场骨灰杯测试赛? 安迪·海 (Andy High) 诺福克郡,蒂特尔沙尔 (Tittleshall, Norfolk)
先生,在板球运动中,衡量一名伟大全能球员的标准是其测试赛击球平均分与测试赛投球平均分之间的差值。伟大的加里·索伯斯 (Gary Sobers)(讣告,7月 18日)的击球平均分为 57.78,投球平均分为 34.03,差值为 23.75。然而,在所有近期对他表达敬意的文字中,都没有提到那位拥有更高测试赛击球平均分 (59.88) 和更低投球平均分 (16.62) 的球员,两者的差值为 43.26。诚然,第二位球员仅得到了 1,078 分并仅拿下了 50 个三柱门——但这是因为女性参加的测试赛数量明显少于男性。那么,埃尼德·贝克威尔 (Enid Bakewell) 是否比加里·索伯斯更伟大的全能球员? 托尼·埃尔古德 (Tony Elgood) MCC 司库,2017-23;萨默塞特郡,温福德 (Winford, Somerset)
先生,在 20 世纪 40 年代,试图破解俄罗斯密码的并不只有美国密码分析师(《我们能破解俄罗斯的冷战密码吗?》,7月 25日)。德国机构理所当然地也采取了同样行动,并取得了一定成效。英美联合 TICOM1 团队在欧洲战争结束前的巴伐利亚之行中证实了这一点。我的父亲(爱德华·拉什沃思少校 [Major Edward Rushworth],一名驻布莱切利园 [Bletchley Park] 的军官)正是那些采访德国对应人员的人员之一,因此他发现包括一台洛伦兹 (Lorenz) 机在内的关键设备被埋在罗森海姆 (Rosenheim) 的主广场上。这些设备以及几辆装满器材(包括一个截获站)、文件和囚犯的车辆被运往英国,为英美机构在冷战期间开发的能力做出了贡献。 海伦·华莱士教授女爵士 (Professor Dame Helen Wallace) 伦敦 SW17
先生,我一生都是《泰晤士报》纵横填字游戏的忠实爱好者。然而,我关注到珍妮·肯扬 (Jenny Kenyon)(信件,7月 24日)在尝试解决谜题时似乎在借助参考资料。在我看来,这是作弊。对我而言,除非一个填字游戏纯粹依靠个人的知识和灵感完成,而没有查阅词典、百科全书、谷歌或者——更糟糕得多——AI,否则不能说该游戏被正确且成功地完成了。我是唯一这么想的人吗? 尼古拉斯·彭宁顿 (Nicholas Pennington) 西约克郡,阿丁汉姆 (Addingham, W Yorks)
先生,希瑟·威尔逊 (Heather Willson)(信件,7月 23日)自豪地接纳她的短发,即使它被认为已经过时。我在 1973 年留过一个非常不合潮流的胡须,现在呢?在 20 世纪 80 年代,我养过三只不合潮流的杰克罗素梗,现在呢?周而复始,流行总会回归。 艾伦·坎贝尔-威尔逊牧师 (Rev Allan Campbell-Wilson) 北约克郡,斯卡伯勒 (Scarborough, N Yorks)
每日万象登记册
英国:大曼彻斯特市长选举的竞选演说。 欧洲:沃达丰集团 (Vodafone Group)、奥迪 (Audi) 和 LVMH 的业绩报告。
自然笔记
在英国海域,尤其是德文郡和康沃尔郡沿岸的浅水区,普通章鱼的数量正在增加。海温上升被认为是这次持续“爆发”的部分原因。这些高度智能且能改变形状的生物非常擅长解决问题;难怪它们已经掌握了猎捕龙虾笼中甲壳类和贝类动物的技巧——它们钻进笼子,用毒液使猎物瘫痪,并在猎物被运上岸供我们食用之前将其吃掉。普通章鱼通常呈棕色且有疣状突起,但它们能在几秒钟内改变皮肤的颜色甚至质地。在神经冲动的指令下,特化细胞会收缩和舒张,从而使色素显现并形成凸起。 melissa harrison
今日生日
Tom Kerridge(如图),厨师、餐厅经营者及电视节目主持人,《酒馆厨房的秘密》(Secrets of the Pub Kitchen, 2024-25),53 岁;Allan Border,澳大利亚板球运动员及体育评论员,71 岁;Sir Christopher Dean,花样滑冰运动员,奥运金牌得主 (1984),68 岁;Bob Diamond,银行家,巴克莱银行 (Barclays) 首席执行官 (2011-12),75 岁;Jo Durie,网球运动员,七次英国国家单打冠军,66 岁;David Edwards,皇家航空学会 (Royal Aeronautical Society) 首席执行官,50 岁;Bobbie Gentry,歌手,《致比利·乔》(Ode to Billie Joe, 1967),84 岁;Sir Demis Hassabis,AI 研究员及神经科学家,诺贝尔化学奖共同获得者 (2024,“因蛋白质结构预测”),50 岁;Lord (Michael) Hintze,CQS (资产管理公司) 创始人,73 岁;General Sir James Hockenhull,英国战略司令部 (UK Strategic Command) 指挥官 (2022-2026 年 3 月),62 岁;Cressida Hogg,英国工业联合会 (CBI)、BAE 系统公司 (BAE Systems, 航空航天、国防和信息安全) 主席,57 岁;Simon Jones,演员,《银河系漫游指南》(The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, 1981),76 岁;Jonathan Rhys Meyers,演员,《都铎王朝》(The Tudors, 2007-10),49 岁;Lord (Mark) Pack,自由民主党主席 (2020-25),56 岁;Robert Rankin,小说家,《禁烟小说》(Snuff Fiction, 1999),77 岁;Pete Reed,赛艇运动员,三届奥运金牌得主 (2008, 2012, 2016),45 岁;Jonty Rhodes,板球运动员,南非国家队 (1992-2003),57 岁;Jordan Spieth,高尔夫球手,公开赛冠军 (2017),33 岁;Dame Emily Thornberry (Lady Nugee),工党 Islington South Finsbury 选区议员,影子总检察长 (2021-24),66 岁;Air Chief Marshal Sir Glenn Torpy DSO,空军参谋长 (2006-09),73 岁;Prof Stephen Westaby,心脏外科医生,作家,《创伤纪事》(The Trauma Chronicles, 2023),78 岁;Joy Whitby,儿童电视节目先驱,《游戏学校》(Play School, 1964),《杰克讲述》(Jackanory, 1965),96 岁;Thomas Young,短跑运动员,残奥会金牌得主 (2020, T38 项目),26 岁。
历史今日
1921 年,由生物化学家 Frederick Banting 领导的多伦多大学研究人员宣布发现了激素——胰岛素。
末尾之词
匆忙推进净零排放增加了消费者的风险和成本。然而,政府仍不负责任地假装这种转型是简单且无代价的。
英国的能源政策加剧了停电风险,并给电费带来了上涨压力。这并非简单的党派指责。正如我们周六报道的那样,这是由国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 委托的一份机密报告所给出的判断。这一问题体现了当前政府思维中最具破坏性的误解之一,即认为所有理想目标都是轻易兼容的,且在追求这些目标时不存在权衡取舍。因此,工党似乎很少考虑设定雄心勃勃的净零碳排放目标对消费者和企业在现实世界中产生的影响。
咨询公司 Cornwall Insight 在其报告中描绘了英国能源准备工作中令人不安的景象。Neso 曾是国家电网 (National Grid) 的一部分,现为国有,它无法可靠地预测能源的供需情况。对净零排放的推进扩大了风电场、太阳能电池板和电池的作用,涵盖了数千家不与 Neso 直接对接的小型供应商。供应端的这种碎片化“降低了对向 GB 电网供电和取电容量的可见度”。
报告中强调的危险绝不仅仅是假设性的。Neso 记录了
印度教育部长因考试泄题而辞职,是对莫迪的一次清算
印度总理纳伦德拉·莫迪正面临德里街头日益高涨的青年反抗。这一局面在周末达到顶点,导致其教育部长达曼德拉·普拉丹辞职。学生抗议者认为普拉丹先生应对一起可追溯至 5 月的腐败丑闻承担道德责任,该丑闻涉及印度竞争极其激烈的医学院入学考试试卷泄露。
毫无疑问,抗议者的诉求已成为印度青年广泛政治不满的象征,这令莫迪先生感到不安。关于大学考试的不满似乎很难成为重大政治起义的素材。但在印度,这起丑闻触及了人们对机会减少和萎靡状态更广泛的感知。在过去十年中,考试泄题已成为常态,且至今没有一名官员被追究责任。对于印度年轻人来说,这种不公平感令人愤慨,因为学术成功被越来越多地视为获得经济安全和社会流动性的唯一手段。
许多年轻学生面临着极其繁重的时间表,每天工作多达 14 小时。印度的
英国年轻人正在发现这种国民饮品所具有的强身之能
茶是由高卢人阿斯特里克斯在公元前 50 年左右引入这个国家的。事实证明,它是古代英国人抵抗罗马帝国主义的力量之源,而那些罗马人则误以为他们饮用的是由阿斯特里克斯的同僚、德鲁伊盖塔菲克斯酿制的魔药。尽管奇怪的是,在 17 世纪之前,任何关于这些群岛的历史资料中都没有进一步提到茶,但其效果是立刻就能被认出来的。它赋予了我们的祖先勇气,而现在正帮助英国年轻人以自信面对诸如求职面试和初次约会等令人生畏的场合。
调查证据显示,近半数的
《泰晤士报》获得的证据表明,在最近的波热浪期间,电网在 23 日反复违反了运行安全限制。简而言之,停电的危险是实质性的。促成因素之一是国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 方面的预测失误,而政府政策也导致了这次失败。国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 必须不断更新其电力供需计算,但如果能源供应商分散,预测就会变得更加困难,而由此产生的任何意外短缺,填补起来的成本要高得多。根据一名向我们提供报告的举报者的说法,国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 在热浪期间是在“盲飞”。能源供应的不确定性增加了国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 必须在短时间内以高于批发市场提前支付价格采购能源的风险。不可避免地,这种短缺将通过账单由家庭和企业承担。
停电风险和成本上升是一个政府政策的可预见结果,该政策未能考虑快速向可再生能源转型所需的权衡。负责任的批评者并不否认气候变化的事实以及遏制排放的必要性。但减轻前者的成本和实现后者的成本并非可以通过简单的愿望就消除。
医学入学考试(该国最艰苦的考试之一)每年约有 2.3 million 人参加,而名额仅有 136,000 个。当今年的试卷泄露时,一批考生面临着重新考试的煎熬,这一决定随后被认为与约十起自杀事件有关。事实上,在到 2024 年为止的十年中,印度的学生自杀人数增加了 80%。
傲慢以及与印度年轻选民关切的脱节,导致印度人民党 (BJP) ——莫迪先生的印度教民族主义执政党——低估了针对它的不满。普拉丹先生将青年抗议者斥为“恐怖分子的 B 队”。将他赶下台的运动采用了“蟑螂人民党”这个名字(是对 BJP 名称的戏仿),这源于莫迪先生盟友的另一次轻率的侮辱。
这一次,印度人民党 (BJP) 惯用的严厉谴责和残酷镇压手段并未奏效。在过去的两个月里,数十万抗议者向德里进发。官方采取了强硬回应,包括反复使用催泪瓦斯、殴打、使用弹 pellet 枪以及试图通过压制行动来……
Z 世代(出生于 1997 年至 2012 年之间的人群)会在这些时刻之前喝一杯茶来稳定情绪。这是一个在历史上有据可查且克制的选择。茶是国民饮品这是一个不争的事实,但它在英国口味中根深蒂固的程度有时并未被充分意识到。
英国的第一家茶馆成立于 1640 年,远早于第一家咖啡馆。而在 200 年之内,大多数咖啡馆都已成为了历史。与此同时,茶已从奢侈品变成了主食。而且它一直如此。在这个国家最黑暗的时刻,在……
可再生能源并非没有缺陷。它们提供的电力具有间歇性;因此,需要维持燃气轮机的运行,以填补向国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 提交的报告中所确定的缺口。其中大部分电力(尤其是风电)是在区域性产生的,随后需要通过高资本成本的基础设施将其传输至他处。可再生能源的成本也并未像其拥护者想象的那样必然下降。
监管机构 Ofgem 正在审查热浪期间的能源供应情况。无可争议的是,电力供应端的复杂性已成为能源专家公认的担忧事项。正如牛津大学的迪特·赫尔姆 (Dieter Helm) 爵士所指出的:“国家能源系统运营商 (Neso) 面临的问题是,这意味着必须承认 [可再生能源] 将耗费更多成本,而这与‘因为有了可再生能源,一切都会变得更便宜’的说法不符。”
对于政策制定者,尤其是工党政府而言,这些教训虽然令人沮丧但十分明确。净零排放既不是免费的午餐,也不是救世神药 (deus ex machina)。这是一个在实现过程中将产生实际成本的目标,且其收益在现阶段与其说是真实的,不如说更具投机性。将未来的能源来源与当前的能源来源进行平衡,比气候乌托邦主义更为理智。
关闭 17 个地铁站并屏蔽移动数据,所有这些手段都无济于事。在灵巧的社交媒体运作协调下,抗议活动反而愈演愈烈。在同意撤换普拉丹 (Mr Pradhan) 先生这一抗议者核心诉求后,印度政府向不可避免的趋势低头了。
这种未能压制异议的行为在多大程度上损害了莫迪 (Mr Modi) 先生的权威尚不确定。在执政 12 年期间,他经常依赖于塑造一个意识形态上毫不妥协的形象。然而,今年夏天的抗议活动团结了印度青年中广泛的政治截面,其核心在于质疑政府潜在的执政能力,而非其价值观。在诉求得到满足后,“蟑螂运动”已发出信号,要求示威者现在应当和平撤离,这表明对莫迪先生地位的直接挑战暂时告一段落。
但学生运动此前曾引发过印度政坛更广泛的动荡。“蟑螂运动”实现目标的这种速度和便捷程度,将令一个习惯于以冷漠面对大众反对的政府感到不安。
第二次世界大战期间,咖啡从未被配给,但茶叶被限制为每名成年人每周两盎司的配额。
对这个国家的烹饪艺术持有怀疑态度无疑是一项传统。法国美食家格里莫·德·拉·雷尼埃尔 (Grimod de la Reynière) 在 1806 年轻蔑地写道:“英国料理仅限于极其乏味的白水煮鸡”。也许曾经确实有一个时期,我们沉溺于食用白煮肉以及远未达到 al dente(适度熟化)状态的蔬菜。但每餐结束时,总有一杯茶来增色。新一代人正在发现这种组合的威力。
24 S1 Monday July 27 2026 | the times World
德黑兰政权更迭至关重要
United States
David Charter Washington
David Charter
本雅明·内塔尼亚胡敦促特朗普总统在明日的白宫会晤前,不要放弃在德黑兰实现政权更迭,此时美国与伊朗在经历了近两周的袭击后暂停了敌对行动。这位以色列总理表示,只有在政权倒台或方向发生明显改变的情况下,冲突才能结束。他目前正准备与特朗普进行首次会面,此前美国和以色列在 28. 二月启动了军事行动。美国官员否认了有关特朗普在周五停止美国空袭的报道,此前有报道称,其将领警告升级将导致美国基地及盟友的防御弹药库存降至极低水平。另有报道称,昨日一艘油轮在霍尔木兹海峡触雷爆炸,凸显了在该关键航道中美国继续封锁伊朗船只的危险局势。
分析人士表示,美国和以色列的目标日益分歧。内塔尼亚胡在关注 10 月以色列大选连任机会的同时,寻求对伊朗政权造成更大破坏;而特朗普在 11 月中期选举临近之际,则在寻求退出策略。在福克斯新闻询问结束战争需要什么条件时,尽管特朗普多次坚持称这并非战争目标,但内塔尼亚胡仍多次提到伊朗政权更迭。“我认为这需要伊朗意识到,要么是该政权倒台,要么是伊朗意识到给世界带来经济混乱、谋杀数千名本国公民以及向所有人开枪的代价……我认为当这个政权被推翻,或者被削弱到意识到必须终止其核计划并改变方向时,战争才会结束,”内塔尼亚胡说道。内塔尼亚胡计划于今日飞往华盛顿,参加亲以色列的共和党参议员林赛·格雷厄姆的葬礼,这将使他能够与特朗普会面,此前由于两国领导人关系恶化,他的几次尝试均被白宫拒绝。特朗普上个月证实了相关报道,称两人曾就以色列持续攻击黎巴嫩真主党而进行过一次充满脏话的电话交谈,而这些攻击破坏了在海湾地区实现停火的尝试。特朗普承认他称内塔尼亚胡为“f***ing crazy”(极其疯狂)。据《纽约时报》报道,特朗普于周五下令停止连续 13 个夜晚对伊朗目标的袭击,据称这是在美国参谋长联席会议主席丹·凯恩将军警告称,此举可能会危险地耗尽该地区保护美国基地和盟友的导弹拦截弹之后做出的决定。副总统 JD Vance 以及
Perry 抗议,如同 烟火般激烈
流行巨星凯蒂·佩里(Katy Perry)表示,她的歌曲《Firework》被用于白宫一段关于伊朗炸弹爆炸的 TikTok 帖子中,这让她感到“深感震惊且愤怒”。
佩里目前与加拿大前总理贾斯廷·特鲁多(Justin Trudeau)交往。她发帖称,她创作这首 2010 年的热门单曲是为了将其作为“那些处于个人最黑暗时刻的人们的希望、治愈和内心力量的赞歌”,并且“绝对不认可”将其用于“军事打击的画面”。
该片段是白宫一系列帖子的最新篇章,这些帖子将伊朗的破坏场景配以音乐,并带有字幕:“伊朗已收到警告。”
41 岁的佩里加入了反对特朗普总统使用其音乐的表演者长名单中,其中包括 Ariana Grande。上个月,当她的 2024 年单曲《Bye》被用来配合一段移民局人员拘留人员的剪辑视频,并配上字幕“拜拜。特朗普总统实现了历史上最安全的边境”时,她请求道:“请不要将我的音乐与这种野蛮、不人道、令人发指的胡闹联系在一起”。随后该音乐被删除。
在佩里发帖后,白宫首席副通讯主任凯兰·多尔(Kaelan Dorr)发布了一段佩里 2012 年歌曲《Part of Me》的视频片段,画面中歌手身穿军装与海军陆战队一起训练。多尔写道:“这是你吗?”
据报道,特朗普的女婿、目前担任中东特使的贾里德·库什纳(Jared Kushner)均呼吁克制,以给和平谈判留出空间。美国驻联合国大使迈克·沃尔兹(Mike Waltz)否认中东的关键武器库存已耗尽。他告诉 NBC News:“总统保留所有选项。”特朗普“正在给谈判留出一些空间”。伊朗方面表示,由于美国停止开火,伊朗也停止了对该地区目标的攻击。军队发言人穆罕默德·阿克拉米尼亚(Mohammad Akraminia)表示:“由于……我们的策略基本上是报复性的,我们也停止了报复行动。”
前美国驻以色列大使、大西洋理事会(Atlantic Council)智库研究员丹尼尔·沙皮罗(Daniel Shapiro)表示,美国和以色列的利益与目标已从微小的差距演变为难以逾越的“深渊”。沙皮罗说:“战争开始时,双方都寄希望于伊朗政权会崩溃。但当很明显该政权能够承受重大军事打击,并对美国军队及海湾国家基础设施目标进行痛苦报复时,特朗普总统意识到适可而止,此后一直在寻找退出机制。”
“与此同时,内塔尼亚胡总理根据 10 月 7 日后的以色列理念行事,即对以色列的威胁必须采取主动出击,不能任其恶化。”预计特朗普明天还将与泽连斯基总统会面,后者将抵达华盛顿参加格雷厄姆(Graham)的葬礼。泽连斯基周六表示,他有俄罗斯援助德黑兰的证据,将与美国共享。“自 7 月初以来,我们记录到俄罗斯对海湾国家及当地美国军事设施的活跃卫星监视。这些图像随后出现在伊朗。同时,俄罗斯对这些地点的卫星图像与伊朗的袭击之间存在明显关联——无论是在袭击前进行准备,还是在袭击后评估造成的破坏,”他说道。
周五,当被问及美国战争秘书皮特·海格塞斯(Pete Hegseth)上周告诉国会中国和俄罗斯在“支持”伊朗时,特朗普表示,“我认为我信任”习主席和普京总统关于他们没有援助伊朗的说法,因为“我认为他们不想让我失望”。
嫌疑人被击毙
德国
Ella Joyner
一名涉嫌在柏林骄傲节(Pride festival)期间发动致命车辆冲撞和刺杀袭击的伊斯兰主义者已被德国警方击毙。
在经过一整天的搜捕后,警员在首都西北部的一块租赁地中发现了阿卜杜勒·巴鲁特(Abdul Ballout),一名 21 岁的黎巴嫩裔德国男子。
柏林警方表示:“据信他持刃具向我们的警员冲来,因此(警员)被迫开火。尽管柏林消防队立即采取了心肺复苏措施,但他仍当场死亡。”当天早些时候,德国内政部长表示,该嫌疑人与“伊斯兰主义圈子”有联系。亚历山大·多布林特(Alexander Dobrindt)在蒂尔加滕公园(Tiergarten park)的袭击现场表示:“我们在这里看到的一切都指向这是一起伊斯兰主义恐怖袭击。”
多布林特表示,据称巴鲁特将一辆面包车开入节日附近的人群中,随后下车并使用可能是一把大砍刀袭击人群,造成一名女性死亡,29 人受伤。
据昨日披露,巴鲁特去年曾前往中东,试图加入伊斯兰国(Islamic State)但未成功。随后,他被判定“准备实施威胁国家安全的严重暴力行为”。他在黎巴嫩被捕并被遣返回德国,在德国被判处一年零十个月的缓刑。他在 2022 年曾因袭击和抢劫被定罪。
周六,数十万人聚集在德国首都参加一年一度的名为“克里斯托弗大街日”(Christopher Street Day)的游行,这是欧洲最大的骄傲节活动之一。
袭击发生在晚上 10 点左右,地点在西部蒂尔加滕地区的伦内大街(Lennestrasse)附近。目击者报告称看到
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LGBT 群体昨日在全市范围内组织了守夜活动。在勃兰登堡门前的巴黎广场(Pariser Platz),人群聚集在一起摆放鲜花和骄傲彩虹旗,以表达与受害者的团结。
总理弗里德里希·默茨(Friedrich Merz)出席了柏林市中心马里恩教堂(Marienkirche)的追思礼,彩虹旗被覆盖在祭坛上。他表示:“这些行为只有一个目的。他们想要分裂我们的社会。他们想要夺走我们拥有最重要的一切——我们的开放和自由。”
在巴鲁特被击毙之前,警方发言人弗洛里安·纳特(Florian Nath)表示,已有数人因该事件接受问询,“其中一些人已被我们拘留或正处于拘留状态”。警方还提到,袭击后有“一名或可能数名人员”离开了那辆面包车。
德国近年来遭受过几次类似袭击。今年 5 月,一名驾驶员将车开进莱比锡一个繁忙的购物区,导致两人死亡,六人受伤。2 月,一名男子在慕尼黑的一场抗议活动中驾车冲撞,导致包括一名幼儿在内的两人死亡,
【图片说明】 在周六的克里斯托弗大街日骄傲节游行袭击后,人们在柏林的勃兰登堡门前摆放鲜花。车辆向人群冲去,随后撞上了一棵树。袭击者随后使用刃具
德国国际与安全事务研究所(SWP)的拉斐尔·博松(Raphael Bossong)表示,显然这存在一种模式,但此类事件难以预防。“我们都使用汽车,你无法对每一个租车的人进行背景审查。这是我们无法
RALF HIRSCHBERGER/AFP/GETTY IMAGES; CHRISTIAN MANG/REUTERS
武器以继续
这场肆虐。下方的
阿卜杜勒·巴卢特(Abdul Ballout)
昨日在警方搜寻
袭击者时被击毙
第 26 页
击落凡尘
如今显得苍老且脱节, 阿姆里特·迪隆(Amrit Dhillon)发自德里
苏格兰茶叶商人 第 28 页
“……蟑螂运动会占据的部分,”班加罗尔的政治分析师桑迪普·沙斯特里 (Sandeep Shastri) 表示。“他们认为可以像对待其他抗议活动那样将其遏制。”执政党有充分的理由相信自己能够挺过这次风暴。12 年来,莫迪似乎坚不可摧。他的政党在一次次选举中获胜,成为了掌控印度 28 个州中 22 个州的霸主。但分析人士指出,在表面之下,公众不满的潜流一直在增长,人们感到生活并没有变得更好。“事实是,数以百万计的印度中产阶级被过去 12 年兴建的新道路、高速公路、港口和机场所带来的虚假安全感所麻痹,但现在他们意识到,这些并没有给他们个人带来利益,”塔夫林·辛格 (Tavleen Singh) 在《印度快报》中写道。自从莫迪上台以来,印度的
GDP 平均每年增长 6.5 %。目前已达到 $4.15 万亿美元,使其成为继美国、中国和德国之后的全球第四大经济体。但就业增长乏力令许多印度人担忧:大学毕业生占失业人口的 60 %。分析师阿拉蒂·杰拉特 (Arati Jerath) 表示:“它 [印度人民党] 变得过于傲慢,与民众过于脱节,但却没意识到这一点。一直在积聚的是对其威权风格以及它所制造的恐惧的愤怒。印度年轻人正在夺回表达自我的权利。”蟑螂党的阿舒托什·兰卡 (Ashutosh Ranka) 表示:“我们的领导人是神吗?我认为在民主制度中,他们应该向我们——选民负责。”直到现在,莫迪一直将“绝不解雇部长”作为原则,以免被视为软弱。早在 2015 年,国防部长拉杰纳特·辛格 (Rajnath Singh) 就曾表示,与之前的政府不同,
“我们的部长不会辞职”。印度许多年轻人并不认同父母对统治机构的尊重。他们不循规蹈矩,具有反叛精神,并且准备嘲讽掌权的“长辈们”。正是因为未能把握 Z 世代的特质,才导致了莫迪的退让。部长们原以为抗议活动会渐渐平息。相反,抗议者加倍努力,并通过社交媒体动员了越来越多的支持。周六,当他们庆祝普拉丹 (Pradhan) 辞职时,一名从马德拉斯赶来的学生耸了耸肩。维杰·雷 (Vijay Rai) 说道:“如果部长们同意与我们交谈,这一切本来是可以避免的。那怎么就那么困难呢?”
2026年7月27日 星期一 | 时报 世界
顺流而下 随着金龙巡游(一项中国古代传统)的举行,木筏在广西自治区的遇龙河中缓缓前行
家属与逝者相伴
远超预期,诺埃拉·姆万齐 (Noella Mwanzi) 驻布尼亚报道,简·弗拉纳根 (Jane Flanagan) 撰写
监督隔离和阴森祭礼的是拉卢的村长 Mayalibo Drajima,他在最近几周见证了数十人死亡,其中包括他的两名亲戚。
“目前,我正让一个十口之家在屋内与一具尸体一同隔离,”他在从刚东部该村打来的电话中说道。“说服他们留在那里很困难,有时他们会拒绝,尽管他们会对他人造成危险。”
在刚果民主共和国东部的许多社区,卫生官员称埃博拉正“像野火一样”蔓延,而拉卢则与专业护理完全隔绝。
那里几乎没有用于洗手的安全水源,也没有防护设备。
“我花自己的钱买了氯,把它混在浇水壶里,喷洒在院子里和所有受感染的地方,”33 岁的 Drajima 说道。
在 5 月 15 日宣布疫情爆发后的十周内,确诊的埃博拉病例数已超过 3,000 例,当局称这是记录以来增长最快的流行病。
非洲疾病控制与预防中心将死亡人数定为 1,031 人。相比之下,2013-16 年的西非流行病(记录中最致命的一次)大约用了八个月时间才达到同样的里程碑。然而,世界卫生组织认为,由于 80% 的新病例处于已知的传播链之外,此次最新爆发的真实规模可能是前者的两到四倍。
卫生官员表示,这场流行病正逐渐失控。在与感染者接触的人群中,被监测的人数不足十分之一,这使得在病例进一步传播病毒之前将其隔离变得更加困难。
从 Drajima 报告一名死亡到举行埋葬之间,可能又有三四个人死亡。人们被禁止举行传统的葬礼仪式,在这些仪式中,他们通常会为尸体清洗、更衣并陪伴。一些家庭
GRADEL MUYISA MUMBERE/REUTERS
医疗工作者在伊图里省 (Ituri province) 的布尼亚 (Bunia) 要求支付未结工资。
Drajima 是该省一个村庄的村长,他表示,说服恐惧的家庭留在隔离区已变得日益困难。
Djugu 地区
刚果
阿尔伯特湖
布尼亚
30 英里
拉卢处于刚果民主共和国最持久的冲突前线之一,即伦杜 (Lendu) 和赫玛 (Hema) 社区之间的部落战争,两者的民兵数十年来一直相互残杀。在该矿产丰富的地区,并行不悖的冲突使得一些社区处于卫生工作者的触及范围之外。
Drajima 将村庄的爆发追溯到两场葬礼,死者是从金矿带返回阿尔伯特湖西岸的拉卢探亲的。数以千计的
矿工在孤立的营地、贸易中心和村庄之间不断移动,这使得卫生官员在病毒开始传播后难以追踪接触者。据认为,埃博拉是通过果蝠传播给人类的。在该地区的手工矿场中,蝙蝠栖息在矿工工作的隧道里,而他们居住的拥挤营地为病毒传播提供了理想条件。
此次爆发是刚果民主共和国 (DRC) 记录的第 17 次流行病,但仅为第三次由 Bundibugyo 菌株引起,目前该菌株尚无经批准的疫苗或治疗方法。周五,牛津大学表示,首位志愿者已接种了针对该菌株研发的实验性疫苗。由于对 Bundibugyo 菌株的检测能力有限,推迟了疫情的确认,导致疫情在 5 月被发现之前,已在无人察觉的情况下传播了数周。首位受害者尚未确定。
拉卢 (Lalu) 所在的伊图里省 (Ituri province) 约占确诊埃博拉病例的 90%,数十名卫生工作者本身也已感染。周六,位于省会布尼亚 (Bunia) 的 Elikya 埃博拉治疗中心的医生、护士和安保人员因工资未结而罢工,扰乱了疫情中心地带的医疗护理。
对于德拉吉马 (Drajima) 来说,这场危机已变成一个由死亡、强制隔离和匮乏支持组成的无尽循环。这位酋长最艰巨的任务之一就是说服村民埃博拉是一种病毒,而非毒药或巫术。即便现在,仍有人指责响应小组将疾病带到了当地。
“昨天我失去了侄子的妻子。前天,我失去了他的女儿,”德拉吉马说。
“有些家庭已经失去了三个人。有时人们问我埋葬小组什么时候到达,但我无法给他们答案。”
台风诺欧 (Noul) 抵达引发山洪担忧
当局表示,在广东省超过 700,000 人被迫撤离家园后,中国在多个省份发布了最高级别的山洪预警。
水资源部与中国气象局联合发布山洪红色预警,预计江西、湖南、广东、四川、陕西、甘肃以及新疆东南部部分地区将出现山洪。
省政府官员表示,诺欧是今年的第 12 个热带气旋,也是本月中国的第三个台风,于英国时间周六晚上约 8.50 分在惠东县登陆。公众被警告要“关注实时监测、洪水预警以及疏散与避险防范”。
中国中央电视台 (CCTV) 表示,预计诺欧在向内陆移动时将带来强风和暴雨,降雨可能会持续到明天。包括福建省在内的一些地区可能会出现特大暴雨。
当局敦促地方政府监测易涝区域,包括山谷、桥梁和建筑工地。
阿根廷总统米莱支持巴西候选人
为小博尔索纳罗助力
三架无人机被击落
演讲草率之耻
意大利
阿莱西奥·佩罗内 (Alessio Perrone) 米兰
一组访问曼谷的青少年在火车上侮辱了一名要求他们保持安静的泰国女性,对此意大利方面已公开道歉。 一段发布在 TikTok 上的视频显示,一名乘坐 BTS 轻轨的女性乘客指责这些学生太吵,她说:“在泰国我们不尖叫,”并询问他们来自哪个国家。学生们嘲笑她,回答道“泰国”,并称她为婊子。一名青少年还竖起了中指。
诚实的重要性 (The importance of being Ernest) 今年在佛罗里达州基韦斯特举行的年度海明威长相相似大赛出现了一个惊喜。超过 130 位希望获胜者在 Sloppy Joe’s 酒吧参加了比赛,最终由来自坦帕的克里斯·达顿 (Chris Dutton)(见上图)获胜,他成为了该赛事 45 年历史上最年轻的冠军。
法国
Adam Sage 巴黎
D-Day 登陆海滩已成为首批被授予世界遗产地位的第二次世界大战战场。此举旨在纪念在诺曼底丧生的盟军和德国士兵。
这五个海滩——以盟军代号 Utah、Omaha、Gold、Juno 和 Sword 命名——以及 Hoc 角(Pointe du Hoc)岬角,在周日于韩国釜山举行的联合国教科文组织(Unesco)世界遗产委员会会议上获得了认可。
官员们表示,此举将有助于保护诺曼底海岸这 50 英里的地段免受开发以及潜在的视觉污染(如风力发电场)。作为申请的一部分,法国必须承诺在该地区及其周围的缓冲区实施更严格的规划规则。
官员们还承诺将为每年访问这些遗址的数百万游客改进信息提供和导向标识。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 美国增援部队在 D-Day, 6 1944 在 Omaha 海滩登陆 ANDY NEWMAN/SLOPPY JOE’S BAR/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
虽然联合国教科文组织长期以来拒绝将战场视为分歧的象征,但诺曼底议会认为,6, 1944 年 6 月 6 日有 156,000 名盟军登陆的海滩已经成为了“和平与和解”的象征。
诺曼底议会负责人 Hervé Morin 表示:“登陆海滩不仅仅是历史遗迹:它们是普世的纪念场所,承载着国家间自由、和平与统一的信息。”
为了强调 D-Day 世界遗产申报中包含的包容性哲学,Morin 补充说,他想到了“在诺曼底战役中阵亡或受伤的 435,000 名士兵”,其中包括约 200,000 名德国人。
Morin 表示,他将在 9 月召集该遗址周边的 121 个区议会官员,以确保所有突出显示 D-Day 登陆海滩和纪念碑的标牌外观一致且易于识别。
诺曼底争取将海滩列入世界遗产名录的运动始于 2008, 但巴黎方面在这一问题上向联合国教科文组织采取初步接触就花时间 6 年。一份 500 页的申请书(其中还包括 18,000 页的附录)于 2018, 提交,但最初由于联合国教科文组织反对将现代战场列入名录而毫无进展。
这一障碍在 2023 年被消除,当时该联合国机构同意将法国和比利时的 139 处第一次世界大战纪念馆和埋葬地(包括英国公墓)列为世界遗产。
更新版的 D-Day
[[IMG_XXXX]] 一名教师和学生在事件后录制了一段道歉视频
而其他人则在笑并继续制造噪音。
在周四发布于社交媒体平台上的视频中,可以听到一名教师用讽刺的语气说道:“很抱歉给你们国家带来了钱。”该教师告诉这名通勤者“闭上你的臭嘴(Shut the f*** up)”,并补充道:“他们只是孩子。”
在视频走红后,数千名社交媒体用户(其中许多是泰国人)在意大利驻曼谷大使馆的 Facebook 页面上留下了愤怒的评论。
原帖已从 TikTok 删除,但在 X 上获得了超过 16 百万次观看。
其他人识别出了这些青少年的身份,并针对其学校的社交媒体账号进行了攻击。一些视频显示,泰国人在意大利人的酒店外等待,要求道歉。
一名泰国用户写道:“带来钱,没有人抱怨,但请也带上一些礼貌。”另一人写道:“给泰国带来钱并不代表你是神。”
该通勤者就此次事件向警方报案。随后,她在 TikTok 上发布了一段该群青少年
申请于去年提交。其获批意味着这些海滩成为了首批被授予世界遗产地位的第二次世界大战战场,尽管其他与该冲突相关的遗址此前已在名录中,例如广岛和平纪念公园和奥斯威辛-比克瑙集中营。
诺曼底议会表示,去年有 1.4 百万人参观了俯瞰奥马哈海滩的诺曼底美军公墓,650,000 人参观了奥克角访客中心,546,500 人参观了位于拉康布的德国军人公墓。其他遗址包括 440,000 人参观的卡恩纪念馆,以及位于圣梅尔教会、致力于纪念跳伞进入诺曼底的美国伞兵的空降兵博物馆,后者吸引了 260,400 人。
法国在联合国教科文组织的遗产名录中有 54 处遗址,英国有 35 处。
其他被授予世界遗产地位的遗址中还包括奥林匹斯山,它是希腊的最高峰,根据希腊神话,这里是古代众神的居所。
向“您、您的家人以及所有泰国人民”道歉”。
“意大利驻曼谷大使馆对此表示深切遗憾,并强烈谴责这种不当行为,”一名代表在周日表示。
“这组未成年游客的不当行为绝不代表意大利人民。”
大使馆补充说,这些学生将被遣返回意大利。
“我们还将尝试再次教育我们的团体,要求他们严格尊重[泰国]文化。感谢你们欢迎我们的到来,我们恳请您的原谅。”
并非“真实犯罪”
澳大利亚
Lisa Creffield 悉尼
一名澳大利亚女性政治家声称,家庭暴力是“双向的”,并且“女性也会失去冷静”。右翼“一国党”(One Nation)党魁保琳·汉森(Pauline Hanson)在一次播客节目中表示,家庭暴力将警察从“真实犯罪”中抽离,并且目前“议会中有太多觉醒(woke)的人,他们正在推动女性权利”。这位 72 岁的参议员否认她的言论是“恶毒”且“危险”的,并表示这些话被断章取义了。
自 15 岁起,每四名澳大利亚女性中就有一人经历过亲密伴侣暴力。平均每周有一名女性被现任或前任伴侣杀害。根据追踪并核实女性谋杀案的登记机构“澳大利亚统计死难女性”(Counting Dead Women Australia)的数据,2026, 年约有 27 名女性被杀害。
在悉尼新南威尔士大学研究性别与澳大利亚政治的布莱尔·威廉姆斯(Blair Williams)表示:“这以及她的政治主张,核心目的就是为了吸引愤怒的白人男性。汉森曾发表过关于反男性偏见的言论,她是非常反女权主义的。”
堪培拉澳大利亚国立大学的玛丽安·索尔(Marian Sawer)表示,澳大利亚政治中“一直存在公开厌女的习惯”,并补充道:“最近的一个例子是墨尔本出现的‘抛弃女巫’(Ditch the Witch)广告牌,攻击的是维多利亚州州长贾辛塔·艾伦(Jacinta Allan)。”
绿党 参议员莎拉·汉森-扬(Sarah Hanson-Young)在 2018, 年一场关于女性暴力的议会辩论中,被要求“停止与男人做爱”;而西澳大利亚州自由党前副党魁特洛伊·巴斯威尔(Troy Buswell)在 2005 年嗅了一名自由党女性工作人员的椅子,并发出性暗示的声音。
朱莉娅·吉拉德(Julia Gillard)作为澳大利亚首位女性总理(2010 至 2013. 年),受到了尤为激烈的攻击。当她演讲时,反对党议员因发出类猴子的噪音而受到批评,而自由党参议员比尔·赫弗南(Bill Heffernan)则指责她“蓄意不孕”。
2012 年,她发表了一篇关于厌女症的演讲,在演讲中她宣布:“我不会接受 [反对党领袖托尼·艾博特] 关于性别歧视和厌女症的教训……如果他想知道现代澳大利亚的厌女症是什么样子,他不需要在 [议会] 中发起动议,他只需要一面镜子。”
威廉姆斯表示,吉拉德当时的演讲未能改变人们的态度,但此后情况有所改善。“女性政治家在性别问题上已经不再那么害怕发声,”她说。
E
来自本报特派记者
richard lloyd parry 长崎
除了许多其他荣誉外,托马斯·格洛弗(Thomas Glover)应该是唯一一个被制成日本毛绒玩具的苏格兰军火商。我在长崎他旧居旁边的礼品店买到了他。他的旧居是一栋 19 世纪的山坡平房,现已改为博物馆,俯瞰着这座城市著名的港口。
他被塑造为一个打着领结、留着胡须的毛绒娃娃,长得很像《大礼堂》(The Muppet Show)里那个脾气古怪的老头沃尔多夫(Waldorf)。在日本,只有非常可爱或非常重要的人才能获得“软玩具”地位。格洛弗的这种“封神”是对一个人的致敬——这个人在家乡几乎被遗忘,但他参与了日本从封建隔离转变为 20 世纪初亚洲主导力量的变革。
在半个多世纪的时间里,他帮助...
爱琴海奇迹
2026年10月至2027年9月
在一次令人难忘的假期中,体验两个迷人的国家,穿行于希腊和土耳其的永恒奇迹之中。旅程始于雅典,标志性的卫城在城市上方傲然屹立;随后前往令人惊叹的梅黛奥拉修道院,它们仿佛悬浮在高耸的岩柱之顶。在德尔斐追随古代朝圣者的足迹,揭开迈锡尼的传奇,并漫步在纳夫普利翁迷人的街道上——这里是希腊最美丽的 seaside 城镇之一。您的冒险将继续在风景如画的萨摩斯岛度过一段轻松时光,随后穿过爱琴海抵达土耳其。探索保存极其完好的以弗所遗址,这是世界上最伟大的考古宝藏之一,并在传奇的特洛伊走进历史篇章。旅程在充满活力的伊斯坦布尔结束,这里是东方与西方的交汇点。惊叹于包括蓝色清真寺和圣索菲亚大教堂在内的建筑杰作,逛逛色彩斑斓的集市,并享受一次令人难忘的博斯普鲁斯海峡游船之旅,欣赏这座城市壮丽的天际线。融合了古老历史、惊心动魄的景观、岛屿魅力和丰富的文化体验,这是一次穿越爱琴海核心地带的非凡之旅。
*价格在印刷时准确。仅针对部分出发日期提供折扣,且已从广告价格中扣除。所示价格基于单人入住带私人设施的双人或双床房,并包含适用情况下的经济舱机票/铁路旅行。所有假期均视供应情况而定。所用图片与 Just You 关联。由 Just You 运营并受其预订条件约束,ABTA Y6412,ATOL 11266,该公司完全独立于 News UK。
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伦敦和曼彻斯特的往返机票,以及海外交通
15 晚三星级和四星级酒店住宿
15 顿早餐和六顿晚餐
游览 纳夫普利翁、埃皮道罗斯、以弗所、希林杰、特洛伊、佩加蒙、加里波利、伊斯坦布尔、雅典
探索 蓝色清真寺、托普卡匹宫和大巴扎
参观 梅黛奥拉修道院
探索 艾瓦利克并品尝 gözleme(土耳其煎饼)
Just You 假期导游
即刻致电 0808 134 7751 thetimes.com/ jy-greeceandturkey 引用代码 TIMES
为日本的煤矿开采、造船和饮啤文化奠定了基础,且这还不包括他作为军火商的活动。长崎的一场展览以庄重的克制指出:“在深刻影响日本现代化的人们之中,他的名字不容忽视。”
格洛弗于 1838 年出生在亚伯丁郡,父亲是一名海岸警卫队成员。他曾担任货运文员,随后前往上海为怡和洋行工作。21 岁时,他开始从事绿茶贸易,并定居在长崎,那里长期以来一直是日本最国际化的城市。
在 16 世纪,作为武士最高统帅统治日本的将军将定居于此的外国传教士和商人驱逐出境,并因恐惧而将国家封闭,以隔绝侵入性的外国影响。在经历了约 250 年的封建隔离之后……
想拿学位?准备迎接一场战争
中国
理查德·斯宾塞 中国特派记者
也许所有父母在孩子第一次出国时都会担心。在中国,由于他们被关于美国城市暴力和移民中介危险的故事所包围,他们采取了极端的措施。
最新的趋势是危险环境培训课程,类似于那些被派往中东战区工作的平民所参加的课程。学生在进入美国大学前可以付费参加训练营,他们对西方生活的初步接触可能包括模拟绑架和抢劫。
在香港报纸《南华早报》记录的一项练习中,学生们正准备就寝,这时一名戴面罩的……
...由于无法接触到现代军事技术,在西方强国驾驶蒸汽铁甲舰强制该国开放贸易并强加一系列不平等条约时,幕府发现自己已变得弱小。由格洛弗和其他英国商人建造的房屋(如今保留在名为格洛弗花园的公园中)看起来像是印度或斯里兰卡的帝国遗迹。它们提醒人们,尽管日本从未成为殖民地,但它距离那种导致帝国中国清朝灭亡的外国统治仅有一步之遥。它是被一群来自日本长州省的叛逆武士所拯救的,他们以“恢复”年轻的明治天皇权力的为名,成功推翻了被称为“幕府”的幕府政府,并迅速使国家现代化。他们在那位年轻的苏格兰茶叶商人的多次帮助下实现了这一目标。
1863, 他秘密地送走了一组年轻的武士,即“长州五杰”,他们前往伦敦在大学学院学习,回国后成为了新政府的高级官员——日本未来的首任首相伊藤博文当时是伪装成一名水手完成了这次旅程。两年后,格洛弗为了获取丰厚回报而冒险地向明治革命者走私了 7,300 支法国和德国步枪。
在接下来的几年里,尽管经历了一次尴尬的破产,他仍为一个渴望变强的弱国最关键的工业做出了贡献:煤炭和船舶。他在附近岛屿上开发煤矿,为新海军订造军舰,建立了该国第一个干船坞,并为长崎造船厂进口了一台苏格兰起重机,至今仍在使用。
这些矿山和造船业务后来发展成了强大的三菱财团。格洛弗创建的酿酒厂后来被称为麒麟(Kirin),现为日本第二大啤酒公司——根据传说,公司标志中那只神兽的胡须灵感来自格洛弗浓密的苏格兰胡须。
他的传记作者们对于他的行为是出于理想主义、雇佣兵式的动机,还是两者的结合而持有分歧——但在实践中这并没有区别。历史学家西德尼·德费尔·布朗(Sidney DeVere Brown)写道:“他不仅向长州出售武器,而且似乎向所有到访者出售,甚至包括幕府。”“长崎当时只是一个人口仅有 40,000 人的小城市,但仅仅 250 到 300 名居住在那里的外国人就永远改变了日本。”
[[IMG_ALAMY]] 托马斯·格洛弗的故居俯瞰长崎港,现为博物馆。这位苏格兰人的影响力如此之大,甚至有人生产了他的软玩具形象。
...一名男子闯入他们的卧室,将他们捆绑,并强迫他们在手机上录制一段信息,要求父母支付赎金。 “我希望我永远不需要用到这些,但在学习之后,我确实感觉警觉性提高了,”一名叫作鲁路(Lulu Lu)的学生告诉该报。
美国,紧随其后的是英国和澳大利亚,仍然是中国学生青睐的目的地。尽管中国大学在快速进步,但西方学位仍然带有声望,并能带来练习英语的机会。一些学生也被更大的自由度和学术开放性所吸引。在上一学年,至少有 260,000 名中国学生在美就读,尽管这一数字已从 300,000 多人有所下降。
然而,中国的教育和...
几十年来,宣传一直强调美国城市的危险,并将其与中国那些虽然限制更多但通常更守法的同类城市进行对比。
自从特朗普总统一方面打击中国与美国科研机构的接触,另一方面打击移民以来,学者被遣返或逮捕的故事让情况变得更加糟糕。
中国当局已经为那些参加政府资助课程而出国的人提供培训。今年,他们增加了一项警告,提醒前往美国的人很可能会面临移民局官员的敌意。
在英国,中国留学生的数量比预期表现得更为坚挺,部分原因是那些对美国感到不安的家长转而将孩子送到了英国。
the times | 星期一 7月 27 2026 29 商业
世界市场
富时 100 指数 (FTSE 100)
10,736.23 (+135.86)
3,500 6月 26 10 7月 3 24 17 6月 26 10 7月 3 24 17 6月 26 10 7月 3 24 17 6月 26 10 7月 3 24 17 6月 26 10 7月 3 24 17
交通特派记者 安保。他表示,新跑道可能有助于解决 16 到 24 岁之间不在就业、教育或培训中(即被称为“尼特族 (Neets)”的人群)这一“定时炸弹”问题——该人群目前已超过 100 万人,即英国每 8 个年轻人中就有 1 人。 伯纳姆希望将福利改革和削减福利支出置于其首相任期的核心位置,并已与前工党内阁部长艾伦·米尔本进行了会谈,后者正在对青年失业和不活跃状态进行审查。
Laurence Sleator
希思罗机场的负责人表示,建设第三条跑道可以帮助 安迪·伯纳姆 提供必要的就业岗位,从而削减国家的福利支出并驱动经济增长。 机场首席执行官托马斯·沃尔德拜 (Thomas Woldbye) 敦促首相支持其跑道计划,并强调了新跑道将创造的“全方位”就业机会,涵盖从工程师到安保人员的所有岗位。
严厉打击 科技巨头”
Emma Powell 媒体与电信编辑
被瑞秋·里夫斯 (Rachel Reeves) 罢免的英国竞争监管机构前主席,目前正带头呼吁安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 政府加强对全球最大科技公司的监管。
竞争与市场管理局 (CMA) 在去年年初根据《数字市场、竞争与消费者法案》获得了新权力,以便在此领域采取更迅速的行动,但批评者表示,该监管机构在执行过程中过于温和。
马库斯·博克林克 (Marcus Bokkerink) 表示:“前任体制采取的方法,最终只会让英国世界领先的科技创新者更难以颠覆占据主导地位的既得利益者,并降低该国对科技的依赖。”
博克林克在去年 1 月被前财政大臣罢免,这是工党推动监管机构将经济增长作为优先事项的争议性举措的一部分;接替他的是前亚马逊英国公司高管道格·格尔 (Doug Gurr)。
他说,CMA 的团队是“世界上最好的”,但“只能在被允许的情况下开放市场”。他指称,斯塔默-里夫斯政府“接管”了 CMA 董事会,并修改了其战略方向,以放缓新权力的执行。
亚马逊和微软的云业务被指定为具有“战略市场地位”的决定被“取消”,且“针对谷歌和苹果在移动端的行为要求被回避”。
具有战略市场地位的企业可以被施加行为要求,旨在提高英国企业的竞争力和消费者的选择。亚马逊和微软则改为同意通过自愿承诺来降低退出费用,并提高不同系统之间的互操作性。
上个月,谷歌被要求给予出版商对其内容使用方式更大的控制权。然而,博克林克表示,虽然这些“基本要求”让出版商对内容拥有了一些控制权,但在实施确保其获得“公平合理”条款(包括支付款项)的规则方面仍止步不前。
CMA 的一名发言人表示,其并不认同上述批评,并在数字市场产生“迅速影响”是“一项关键优先事项”,并补充说其“在开放搜索和移动领域竞争方面的行动记录是明确的”。
博克林克说:“新任的伯纳姆政府似乎比前任更清楚,帮助消费者和创业企业实现广泛增长的最佳方式,就是在公平竞争的环境中进行竞争——科技基础设施和服务也不例外。在对一个焕发活力的 CMA 给出新指导时明确这一点,将有助于释放经济的新动力。”
商业、创新、科学与贸易部表示:“CMA 最近在道格·格尔和萨拉·卡德尔 (Sarah Cardell) 的领导下实现了令人瞩目的转型,并提高了其速度、可预测性、比例性和流程。”
Dow Jones 51,947.25 (-199.17) 11,000 10,800 10,600 10,400 10,200 10,000 9,800 54,000 53,000 52,000 51,000 50,000 49,000 Jun 25 10 24 Jul 2 17
大宗商品 货币
黄金 $4,077.05 (+55.8) $ 4,500
布伦特原油 (下午6点) $91.00 (+3.34) $ £/$ $1.3344 (-0.0101) 110 100 90 80 70 60
沃德比 (Woldbye) 告诉《泰晤士报》:“增长议程绝对是必要的;这是让我们走出教育挑战的途径。这个国家有 100 万名尼特族 (非在学、非在职、非在训青年),我认为这是一个定时炸弹。我们需要解除这个炸弹。这 [第三跑道] 就是实现目标的途径之一。
“有些人从事安保工作,他们从我们这里获得一些教育;从事行李处理的人员并非高技能岗位。那么在开发阶段,你就需要建筑师——”
5,000 4,000
“……建筑师、工程师,”他说。“我们创造的就业机会真正涵盖了所有领域。”
伯纳姆此前对该计划表示过怀疑。他在去年1月的《时报》广播电台(Times Radio)采访中表示,该跑道可能会使“基础设施投资从北方转移,并将其困在伦敦和东南部”,并称这违背了“一个更平衡、更加升级的经济体”。
一份交通部报告指出,这一耗资 £49 billion 项目的经济效益可能是有限的。
MIKAEL JANSSON/HUGO BOSS
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沃尔德比表示,他已经就该提案联系了伯纳姆的团队。他的计划得到了布伦基特勋爵的支持,后者是希思罗局部增长工作组主席,也是伯纳姆在担任工党领袖后的首次演讲中称其为“导师”的人。
布伦基特表示:“如果我们不采取行动,为目前没有明确目标的100万年轻人确保机会,我们可能会辜负这一代人。而当我们等待……”
推动英国 创新
James Hurley 商业副编辑
一些英国最大规模的养老金提供商组成的财团已同意探讨创建一项新基金,以支持最具潜力的英国私营公司。
这项所谓的“英国规模化基金”(UK Scale-up Fund)提案得到了几家养老金管理机构的支持,其中包括管理 £34 billion 资产并监督铁路养老金计划的 Railpen;政府的职场养老金计划 Nest;以及英国最大的养老金池之一、负责约 £120 billion 资产的 Border to Coast。
该新基金预计将管理超过 £1 billion,政府表示,该基金将具有“足够的规模,以瞄准源自英国科学与技术创新中的最佳机会”。
政府表示:“通过汇集主要养老金投资者,英国规模化基金将有助于将机构资本与推动下一波英国创新的公司、创始人及风险投资经理联系起来。”
安迪·伯纳姆表示,该计划将“有助于解锁每个邮政区良好的增长,将养老金投资与将使英国重新工业化并创造未来就业机会的企业家和技术联系起来”。
国家经济发展机构英国商业银行(British Business Bank)正与这些养老金提供商合作。
据悉,关于该基金的讨论尚处于早期阶段,目前尚无关于基金授权或结构的详细信息。此次讨论背景是,人们担心养老金基金支持英国公司的进展过于缓慢。
《星期日泰晤士报》报道称,英国最活跃的私营公司股权投资者——商业增长基金(Business Growth Fund)推迟了一次 £500 million 的融资,据称是因为英国养老金基金表现得较为犹豫。
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被雷切尔·里夫斯(Rachel Reeves)免职的英国竞争监管机构前主席现已带头呼吁安迪·伯纳姆政府加强对全球最大科技公司的监管。 2
希思罗机场负责人表示,建设第三条跑道可能帮助首相提供所需的就业机会,从而降低国家的福利开支并驱动经济增长。 3
一些英国最大规模的养老金提供商组成的财团已同意探讨创建一项新基金,以支持最具潜力的英国私营公司。 4
随着中东地区冲突重启给新任财政大臣在秋季预算案前带来压力,英国面临“一段持续的弱增长期”。预测机构 EY Item Club 的预测显示,GDP 增长率将从 2025 年的 1.3% 减缓至今年的 0.9%,并将在明年进一步弱化至 0.7%。 5
受建筑和融资成本上升的影响,开发商建设的新办公室数量处于过去二十年来的最低点。 6
唐卡斯特谢菲尔德机场在计划重新开放前,正将其定位为军事货运和武器的区域中心,旨在利用预期中国防开支增加的机会。 7
位于西约克郡布拉福德附近商业园区的楼梯升降机公司 Acorn Mobility Services 向其总部位于摩纳哥的创始人支付了 £50 million 的股息,使其在过去 12 年中的总派息额超过 £350 million。 8
由工党《就业权利法案》于 4 月成立的公平工作局(Fair Work Agency)负责人正寻求打击剥削员工的行为。智库决心基金会(Resolution Foundation)估计,每年有 900,000 名工人的部分假期工资被扣除。
预计到年底 将有近两次 完整的加息
Simon French,
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热浪与减肥药正削弱 该连锁店的成功, Jessica Newman 撰文
对于大多数英国公众来说,近期的热浪是去啤酒花园、参加烧烤派对以及冲向当地商店冰淇淋货架的邀请函。然而,对于 Greggs 的董事会来说,这却是一个开始担忧的信号。而且担忧并非没有理由。去年此时,这家富时 250 (FTSE 250) 烘焙连锁店在异常高温导致消费者不愿购买其烘焙点心(包括其著名的香肠卷,去年销量超过 300 million 份)后,被迫发布了利润预警。今年英国同样不缺极端高温,且预计更炎热的夏季将成为新常态,因此在消费者摒弃热糕点之际,Greggs 董事会可能必须在维持客流量的挑战面前坚定信心。城市分析师预计,天气为 Greggs 带来了不利影响,该公司定于周三公布半年报。虽然该公司在 6 月热浪期间暂时关闭了近十家门店,且此前可能预期夏季表现强劲,但 Jefferies 的分析师表示,交易情况“明显走软”。Goodbody 的分析师 Patrick Higgins 呼应了这一担忧,他表示,虽然截至 6 月 27 日的七周对比数据疲软,但由于持续的不利天气和低迷的消费需求,他并不预期该集团的业绩有所改善。Greggs 的主经纪商 Investec 预计,周三的数据将显示税前利润大幅增长至 £75 million 以上,这得益于年化成本削减、新店开业以及价格上涨。该公司已告知股东,由于与德比新配送中心相关的固定成本增加(该中心预计将于年底前全面投入运营),下半年的利润预计将下降。
主要股东反对 Pinewood 出售案
Pinewood Technologies 最大的股东之一拒绝支持该公司提议以 £545 million 出售给一家美国私募股权公司的计划,原因是其收购要约中包含一项“史无前例”的条款。
持有 Pinewood 5.7% 股份的 Harwood Capital 对 Ridgeview Partners 设定的优先清算权表示不满。
周五晚上,Ridgeview 提出了每股 448 便士的 Pinewood 收购报价。该公司在 2024. 年出售其全国汽车经销商连锁店之前名为 Pendragon。目前,该公司专注于向汽车零售商销售专有的经销商管理软件。
根据该提案,Pinewood 的股东可以选择将持有的股份出售换取现金,或将其滚动至新公司。在报价文件中,Ridgeview 表示,如果未来发生任何出售或清算,它将首先获得全额偿付,而任何选择滚动的 Pinewood 股东则……
尽管预计下半年利润将下降,但 Greggs 至今向市场指引称,全年利润将与去年的 £167.4 million 处于类似水平。分析师的共识是,该公司今年的销售额将达到 £2.29 billion,高于 2025 年的 £2.15 billion。
虽然不可预测的天气可能是导致消费者行为短期波动的部分原因,但 Greggs 面临的深层压力源于对其增长轨迹的结构性焦虑。
尽管市场波动,但这家纽卡斯尔帝国拥有真正的规模——截至 5 月拥有超过 2,750 家店铺——以及一套持续引起英国消费者共鸣的廉价且愉悦的经营模式。而且它不仅仅依赖香肠卷——2025 年其披萨切片销量超过 70 million。
然而,Greggs 在过去几年中遭遇了 fortunes 的反转。其股价在 2021 年达到峰值 £34.16,,而现在交易价格为 £15.82.。该股在 2025, 年经历了创纪录的最差年度表现,下跌 37%。
自 2024, 年年中以来,Greggs 一直受到销售增速放缓的困扰,并坦言正在应对艰难的贸易环境,将其归因于疲软的消费背景。由于通货膨胀导致工资和原材料成本上升而被迫提高的价格,考验着即使是最忠诚客户的忠诚度,许多经济拮据的家庭似乎正在削减消费习惯。
随着销售增长放缓,市场对该公司激进的门店扩张计划的怀疑程度增加,投资者质疑其向超过 3,000 家门店推进的目标究竟是对增长的可持续追求,还是走向收益递减和同类相食的行径。
这家英国最大的烘焙连锁店走过了很长一段路。1951 年,约翰·格雷格 (John Gregg) 在纽卡斯尔的戈斯福思 (Gosforth) 开第一家店之前,曾在泰恩赛德 (Tyneside) 向家庭配送鸡蛋和酵母。无论人们是否喜爱,Greggs 都是英国最知名的品牌之一;一个为其赢得了……
关于其持股的权益将不得不排队等待。
“我这辈子从未见过这种情况,”Harwood的创始人克里斯托弗·米尔斯(Christopher Mills)表示。“假设一切都出了问题,Pinewood 后来以 £300 million(3亿英镑)的价格出售,我们的客户将次于 [Ridgeview],可能会损失所有资金,而 Ridgeview 则分文不损。”
“这将在伦敦股票市场开创一个绝对的先例。尽管我们认为无法收回资金的可能性极低……但这会打开大门 [让其他收购者也效仿]。优先清算权的概念将为英国股票投资者创造一个具有破坏性的新先例。”
Harwood 计划对该交易投反对票,不过 73, 岁的米尔斯希望 Pinewood 董事会会推动修改条款。他说:“如果他们能使其公平,我们将 [支持出售] 并进行股权滚动。如果我们无法在公平条款下进行滚动,我们希望这家公司保持独立。”
Pinewood 的董事会已经表示,如果 Ridgeview 正式出价每股 448p,董事会将“倾向于建议”股东接受该报价。一些持有近一半股份的主要股东表示他们将接受该报价。
支持该交易的包括 Lithia,它是美国最大的汽车经销商集团,两年前收购了原 Pendragon 业务,目前持有 Pinewood 32 per cent 的股份。
Pinewood 的一名发言人表示:“Harwood Capital 有权对潜在交易做出自己的判断。Pinewood 董事会认为 Ridgeview 的提案……具有吸引力,它为企业提供了资本充足且战略一致的合作伙伴的支持,同时让股东有机会以高于当前股价的显著溢价以现金方式实现投资回报。”
“股票替代方案则允许具有相应风险承受能力的股东继续持有投资。”
记者已就此联系 Ridgeview 寻求评论。
[[IMG_XXXX]] Greggs 在罗杰·怀特赛德(Roger Whiteside,右图)的带领下成为了英国最知名的品牌之一。
在 1984 年于伦敦证券交易所上市后,其市值当时为 £15 million(1500万英镑),拥有略高于 260 家店铺的组合,随后公司稳步前进,直到罗杰·怀特赛德于 2013 年接任首席执行官。正是怀特赛德将 Greggs 从传统的“带回家”面包店转型为一种随买随走的即食运营模式,并在产品线中加入了沙拉、三明治、卷饼以及纯素香肠卷。
到 2022 年 5 月他退休时,在监督公司股价增长七倍后,Greggs 已经拥有了超过 2,100 家店铺。
在罗辛·库里(Roisin Currie)接替怀特赛德出任首席执行官(此前她担任零售与物业总监)后,Greggs 继续保持其
国民瑰宝的地位。
第三条跑道是“就业驱动的关键”
根据 Milburn 审查报告的建议,有些杠杆我们需要用双手全力撬动。
“像希思罗机场扩建这样的项目承诺将带来数万个新机会,所有这些都由私人投资支持。这是一个单一项目就能改变的数万人的生活和生计,而且该项目已准备就绪,等待启动。”
希思罗机场希望作为一项 £49 billion(490亿英镑)投资的一部分,在 2035 年前建成一条由私人出资的 3,500m 跑道。
由酒店大亨苏林德·阿罗拉(Surinder Arora)提议的另一种较短的跑道方案也在考虑之中,尽管政府表示更倾向于希思罗机场的计划。
沃尔德拜(Woldbye)声称,全国范围内的“沉默大多数”支持该机场增加跑道。
“这就是我的经验,”他补充道。“人们只能看到积极的一面:经济增长、创新和就业。只有当你离得越近,才会感受到干扰和噪音。离得越远,你的态度就越积极。”
于 2013 年就任首席执行官并扩大了其产品供应
在其任命以来开设了 650 家以上的店铺,以此大幅增加门店数量。 Currie 坚信,通过进驻尚未进入的城镇,以及交通枢纽和诸如“得来速”(drive-thrus) 等路边地点,长期来看,Greggs 的店铺组合有空间增长到 3,000 家以上。 一旦其位于德比 (Derby) 的配送中心
Emma Powell 媒体与电信编辑
研究表明,尽管担心地缘政治动荡可能带来的经济后果,近一半的英国公司计划在接下来的 12 个月内增加投资。
在劳合社银行集团 (Lloyds Banking Group) 调查的企业中,仅有 7 per cent 表示投资意愿有所下降,而 47 per cent 打算增加支出。
约四分之三的企业表示,投资对于“未来的增长和韧性至关重要”,其中东米德兰兹、苏格兰、伦敦和西北部的企业信心最高。大多数支出正投向技术和人工智能基础设施。
劳合社银行商业银行首席执行官 Amanda Murphy 表示:“虽然许多企业已经获得了投资资金,但仍有相当一部分尚未部署。”
她补充道:“投资驱动生产力、竞争力和长期增长。确保企业拥有前进的信心、资金和支持至关重要。”
安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 希望商业投资能够增加,这是英国经济的一个薄弱环节。官方统计数据显示,在今年第一季度,英国的整体经济投资(包括商业和公共部门投资数据)在 G7 领先经济体中最低。
劳合社的研究表明,能源价格下降和经济状况稳定是促使企业增加投资的因素。这一发现与该银行在 6 月底进行的另一项调查相呼应,后者发现企业信心在当月有所下降。
运营成本上涨的压力、贸易环境恶化以及流动性限制是阻碍企业增加支出的最大因素之一。劳合社表示,公司最担心的是
和凯特林 (Kettering) 已投入运行,Greggs 将拥有为 3,500 家门店提供服务的能力。资本支出在过去几年中大幅上升,在 2025 年达到峰值 £287.5 million,当时公司对其投资组合进行了投资并开发了将“支持下一阶段增长”的新物流基础设施。Greggs 预计在 2026, 将支出 £200 million,该数字将在 2027, 下降到 £150 million 至 £170 million 之间,管理层认为届时该集团“强大的经营现金产生能力将为现金回报创造实质性空间”。一名城市分析师认为,Greggs 面临的主要问题是陷入了进退两难的境地。“如果 Greggs 不继续执行其开店计划,那么可以说他们没有利用好新基础设施,”该分析师表示。该公司目标在 2026. 年实现约 120 家净新增门店。然而,该分析师表示,如果他们在消费者仍面临压力的情况下,“暂时将该规模缩减至 80 到 100 家门店,我也不会感到遗憾”。Currie 同样被迫应对一个更新的现象:减肥药。
人们担心 Wegovy 和 Mounjaro 等药物会影响人们对肉馅酥饼和甜点需求的顾虑是可以理解的。首席执行官承认,抑制食欲的药物导致人们寻求更小的分量。作为回应,公司已开始提供更健康的产品,如鸡蛋盅、隔夜燕麦和蛋白奶昔。Jefferies 的分析师 Andrew Wade 警告称,这些药物使用量的增加对公司而言是一个“结构性问题”,可能会使 Greggs 失去一些最优质的客户。“可能只有 10 per cent 的 GLP-1 用户会在 Greggs 购物,”Wade 表示。“但那 10 per cent 将是体重指数 (BMI) 较高、摄入大量热量的人群,我们可以推断,他们可能是 Greggs 最好的客户之一。”本月早些时候上市的首款减肥药片的出现,无疑将继续 1
重塑更多人的购物和饮食方式。”Greggs 应对消费者环境冷却以及健康趋势演变的能力,将是对管理层的决定性考验。
关于生产成本上升的问题,很可能与海湾冲突引发的能源价格上涨有关。美国与伊朗之间新一轮的攻击触发了布伦特原油价格的回升,目前交易价格约为每桶 $93。
劳埃德指数(Lloyds index)显示,私营企业的情绪在 6 月下降了 3 个百分点,至 44%,低于 12 个月平均水平的 47%。经济乐观情绪也下降了 4 个百分点,至 31%。
政治不稳定增加了企业的不确定性,Burnham 成为了四年内的第五任首相。他承诺将成为“工党的亲商领导者,正如我之前担任大曼彻斯特市长时那样亲商”。
上周,他将英格兰境内酒吧、俱乐部和现场音乐场地的营业税(business rates)降低了 20%,他将其描述为给陷入困境的公司提供的“第一步”。然而,企业主们呼吁政府采取进一步行动,改革营业税制度。
分析师和威斯敏斯特的新卫兵都将密切关注银行业的半年报,因为该行业仍可能是提高税收的潜在目标。
巴克莱银行 (Barclays)、劳埃德银行 (Lloyds) 和国民西敏寺银行 (NatWest) 前六个月的合并税前利润预计将略高于 £14.1 billion,比 2025. 同期的 £12.3 billion 增长了 14.6 per cent。这些数据紧随华尔街巨头们的巨额利润之后而至。
当财政部官员试图寻找资金来支持首相 安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham) 那日益增长的让利清单时,这些数据不太可能逃过他们的法眼。
面对关于可能征收附加费的问题,高管们可能会强调银行部门承担的税率已经远高于其他领域,并且将成为任何增长计划的核心。
与此同时,分析师将留意能源成本预计上涨是否会带来贷款损失增加的风险。
周二
在 GSK 发布半年报的同时,金融城的注意力将牢牢集中在周二晚些时候该富时 100 (FTSE 100) 制药集团的战略更新上,此次更新将由自 1 月起担任首席执行官的 Luke Miels 主导。
分析师之间的一致收入预测为第二季度 £8.2 billion。但投资者将希望 Miels 重申 GSK 2031 年 £40 billion 的核心收入目标,并概述公司将如何克服其重要的 Dolutegravir 系列产品(用于治疗 HIV)从 2028 年起失去专利独占权的挑战,以助力实现该目标。瑞银 (UBS) 分析师表示:“在第二季度业绩公布时,我们期待获得关于研发管线和更广泛投资组合的更新。”
年度报告:Games Workshop 中期报告:Bodycote, Croda International, Man Group, Unite 交易更新:巴克莱银行 (Barclays), GSK, 联合利华 (Unilever)
周三 周四
伦敦投资者将在周三醒来并消化力拓 (Rio Tinto) 的半年报,这家英澳矿业巨头于周二深夜发布了报告。根据加拿大皇家银行资本市场 (RBC Capital Markets) 的 Ben Davis 称,这家富时 100 (FTSE 100) 集团预计报告上半年息税折旧及摊销前利润增长 28 per cent,达到 $14.87 billion。
该公司开采铁矿石、铜、铝和锂,此前已发布上半年产量数据,报告铜当量产量增长 3 per cent。其规模较小的竞争对手嘉能可 (Glencore) 计划于周三发布产量数据。
年度报告:Altitude Group, Hargreaves Services 中期报告:Aston Martin Lagonda, Glencore, Greggs, Rio Tinto, St James’s Place 交易声明:Paragon Banking Group, PayPoint, Sage 经济:美国利率决议
周五
国际航空公司集团 (International Consolidated Airlines Group) 在发布半年报时,预计将进一步揭示航空业在面对中东冲突时所遭遇的困境。
投资者将希望不要重复因霍尔木兹海峡周围冲突再次升级而引发的糟糕局面。
金融城还将密切关注对住房市场发展方向的任何评估,以及通过股票回购和分红进行资本分配的前景。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 上周在埃塞克斯郡哈洛的 安迪·伯纳姆 (Andy Burnham)。财政部官员将有兴趣关注银行的利润。
伊朗的战争与其说是劳斯莱斯 (Rolls-Royce) 投资者最初所担心的诅咒,不如说是一种福祉,因为它再次推动了各国政府增加国防开支。劳斯莱斯为战斗机和军舰制造发动机,但其单一最大的业务线是用于长途空中客车 A350 飞机的 Trent XWB 发动机(见下文)。
在 3 月份出现波动后,劳斯莱斯的股价在本月创下新高。如果该公司不重复其预测,将 2026, 年的年度潜在营业利润增长至 £4 billion 和 £4.2 billion 之间,并产生 £3.6 billion 到 £3.8 billion 的自由现金流,那将令人惊讶。
中期报告:英美资源 (Anglo American)、BAE、海力昂 (Haleon)、劳合社银行集团 (Lloyds Banking Group)、伦敦证券交易所集团 (London Stock Exchange Group)、劳斯莱斯 (Rolls-Royce)
交易更新:Foxtons、Pets At Home、壳牌 (Shell)
经济:英格兰银行利率决定
根据 Factset 的数据,IAG 将实现 €29.7 billion 的营收和 €3.5 billion 的税前利润。
中期报告:IG Group、IMI、IAG、ITV、Melrose Industries、国民西敏寺银行 (NatWest)、培生 (Pearson)、Rightmove、Taylor Wimpey
经济:Nationwide 房价指数
在英国航空 (British Airways) 所有者的第一季度财报中出现的意外情况,当时该公司告知股东,由于油价上涨造成 €2 billion 的损失,年度利润将低于最初预期。
分析师们的共识是
海湾战争重启将使“英国经济在两年内放缓”
Mehreen Khan 经济编辑
据一家领先的预测机构称,由于中东地区冲突重启,在秋季预算案出台前给新任财政大臣带来了压力,英国正面临一个“持续的弱增长期”,经济面临连续两年放缓的风险。EY Item Club(一家使用与财政部相同模型的预测机构)的预测警告称,受近期油价上涨影响,GDP增长率今年将放缓至 0.9%,低于 2025, 的 1.3%,且明年将进一步削弱至 0.7%。这将是自 2023. 疫情封锁结束以来最疲软的经济增长期。在美国与伊朗的停火协议破裂以及冲突扩大至红海(也门胡塞武装在该地区袭击了来自沙特阿拉伯的油轮)后,全球油价自五月以来首次触及每桶 $100 。
Item Club 首席经济顾问 Matt Swannell 表示,英国正面临一个“持续的弱增长期”,且全球因素推高能源成本的情况几乎没有缓解。“未来一年左右的增长前景可能充满挑战。在需求已经低迷的情况下,更高的能源价格增加了家庭和企业的压力,”Swannell 说道。“经济将会前进,但速度将比我们过去几年看到的要慢。”这种疲软的增长前景对于 安迪·伯纳姆 来说是一个打击,他曾承诺通过降低生活成本、将经济重心从伦敦及其东南部转移,来重启经济。油价上涨、政府借贷成本增加以及增长预期下降的结合,可能会在今年秋季新任财政大臣 John Healey 的首次预算案中,抹去他在 工党 财政规则下可利用的数十亿英镑空间。独立估算认为,Rachel Reeves 在上次预算案中留下了 £23 billion 的规则缓冲,而这部分资金可能已被削减了一半以上。决心基金会 (Resolution Foundation) 表示
对包括数据安全、版权和法律责任在内的问题的担忧,正阻碍小公司采用人工智能。小型企业联合会 (FSB) 在一份报告中表示,企业在为了提高生产力而全面拥抱 AI 之前,需要针对“基本问题”获得“明确的答案”。不过,这家全国最大的雇主组织的研究发现,许多公司已经报告称从 OpenAI 和 Anthropic 等“大语言模型”的兴起中获得了一些收益,其中五分之三的公司表示看到了生产力的提升,四分之一的公司表示这有助于增加收入。FSB 表示,小型企业的 AI 采用率自 2023, 以来几乎翻了三倍。然而,该组织补充道,十之九以上的人仍然对包括数据安全、版权和法律责任在内的问题感到担忧。大约三分之一的人表示,关于实施该技术的更好指导将鼓励他们采用。这份报告出台之际, 安迪·伯纳姆 刚刚赋予 AI 部长 Kanishka Narayan 内阁席位。关于 AI 行业投入的巨额投资是否能通过提高生产力来证明其合理性,质疑声日益增加。国家统计局表示,迄今为止,在拥有 10 名或更多员工的英国企业中,AI 的采用相对浅层,每个采用该技术的企业的平均使用 AI 技术数量自 2023 年以来仅小幅上升,从约 1.4 增加到约 1.6。FSB 政策主席 Tina McKenzie 表示:“技术正在快速迭代,但太多人在询问关于数据、版权和责任的基本问题,他们理应得到明确的答案。新任 AI 部长有一个真正的机会,能让英国成为全球最适合小型企业的场所。”
企业采用AI,但只有在他在政府方案中将“信任”放在核心位置时,这种情况才会发生。“这意味着要就谁拥有AI生成的内容、数据将如何被使用,以及在出现问题时谁负责,给予他们明确的答案。他还应确保小企业不会在独自应对这项快速变化的技术。‘他们必须能够获得实际的指导和支持,以帮助他们安全且自信地采用AI。’”
伦敦办公楼市场在租金飙升中无视建筑业低迷
Tom Howard 房产记者
英国开发商受限于更高的建筑和融资成本,新建办公楼的数量处于过去二十年来的最低点。
在截至6月为止的 12 个月中,全国范围内开工的办公楼面积略低于 4.5 million 平方英尺,相当于九栋“小黄瓜”大楼。这是房地产分析供应商 CoStar 自 2004 年底以来记录的最低年化总量,仅为全球金融危机后建设规模的一半。
在 2007, 办公楼建设市场的巅峰期,英国新办公楼的开工面积接近 24 million 平方英尺。
这种减速在地区城镇和城市中最为明显。 2021 年,约一半的在建办公空间位于伦敦,但这一比例现已上升至 73 per cent,CoStar 表示这是“记录在案的最高比例之一”,且是至少 20 年来的最高水平。
CoStar 分析高级总监 Patrick Scanlon 表示,近期活动的下降反映了“持续的经济不确定性、高额的债务成本以及虚高的建筑和劳动力成本的综合影响”。
该数据凸显了各类开发商面临的可行性挑战。
在过去一年左右的时间里,房屋建筑商也缩减了其目标,其利润被明显提高的成本和停滞不前的房价所挤压。这种低迷在行业数据中有所体现,标普全球(S&P Global)的英国建筑业采购经理指数处于六年低点,且远低于能预示同比增长的水平。
对于办公楼开发商而言,全新、先进的大楼租金飙升,至少改善了他们在首都一些规划方案的经济效益。
企业日益希望将总部设在这些“顶尖”空间,但空间的短缺导致伦敦的租金快速上涨。
莱坊(Knight Frank)估计,自 2020, 年起,伦敦金融城的顶尖租金上涨了 46 per cent,而西区(West End)过去六年的租金总增长率为 68 per cent。
战斗的重启导致油价飙升,侵蚀了 Rachel Reeves 留下的财政空间。
该空间为 £7 billion,而 Swannell 表示,该空间可能已下降了四分之一,仅剩 £17 billion 多。这种侵蚀程度可能会迫使 Healey 在其首次预算案中提高税收或宣布削减开支。
Swannell 表示:“当前的财政框架为大幅增加支出留下的空间很小。”
政府已宣布到本十年末将国防支出增加 £4 billion,其中 £1 billion 尚未落实资金。
Item Club 表示,由于油价上涨提高了 Ofgem 在下半年的能源价格上限,通胀率将在今年达到 3.5 per cent 的峰值,而 6 月份已降至 2.6 per cent。
预测者表示,失业率将从目前的 5 per cent 升至 5.5 per cent ——这意味着将有 200,000 人失业。
Swannell 表示,能源价格上涨和劳动力市场疲软意味着利率在今年剩余时间将维持在目前的 3.75 per cent。
英格兰银行将于本周四做出下一个决定,预计将维持基准利率不变。
版权 担忧阻碍 AI 采用
James Hurley
每年每平方英尺的租金超过 £100,这增强了开发商的投资理由。 然而,其他城市的租金要低得多,而建筑和融资成本大致相似。根据 Savills 的数据,去年夏天曼彻斯特最顶级的办公室租金约为每平方英尺 £45。 这些地区在可行性方面面临的挑战将引起 安迪·伯纳姆 的关注,他一直致力于推动“全国每个角落的增长”。 Scanlon 表示,英国的政治不确定性以及关于 伯纳姆 想要将国家带向何方的疑问,已经“增加了 [开发商] 在启动新项目时的紧张感”。
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金融市场并不预期英格兰银行在本周提高利率。经济学家也持有相同观点。近期令人鼓舞的通胀数据、新任财政大臣在税收和支出意图上的缺乏明确性,以及海湾地区动荡事件的共同作用,意味着目前没有采取行动的紧迫性。至少目前如此。然而,随着全球油价在每桶 $100 左右波动,天然气价格在过去一个月上涨了 50 per cent,且集装箱运费稳步上升,这可能只是暂时的缓解。投资者目前预计英格兰银行到年底将再次加息近两次,因为银行正面临这样一个前景:6 月份看到的 2.7 per cent 的通胀率已经是最好的结果了。对于 工党 来说,将其就任以来六次降息吹嘘为其标志性成就之一——鉴于这些降息与政府政策几乎没有关系,这一说法一直令人怀疑——由约翰·希利(John Healey)和 安迪·伯纳姆 组成的新经济领导团队可能很快就得改变口风。首先要注意的是,提供给家庭和企业的抵押贷款、贷款和储蓄利率已经反映了经济背景的快速变化。零售银行并没有等待央行的动作。随着通胀风险重新出现,抵押贷款利率已升至一个月以来的最高水平。英国政府十年期借贷成本也攀升至 5.1 per cent —— 徘徊在上次出现在全球金融危机之前的水平。全球最大的债务国——美国政府——目前其十年期借贷的年利率为 4.7 per cent。对于渴望投资收益的投资者来说,这些在名义上至少是极其丰富的选择。他们之所以能要求如此高的回报,不仅是因为
他们看到了高通胀
财政大臣约翰·希利
可能得改变他的口风
为您的墙面增添些幽默感
寻找由我们的漫画家创作的签名装裱精选作品,
即将推出,而且是因为他们看到企业部门的利润增长强劲。因此,各国政府必须竞争资本。回到央行,或许矛盾的是,金融市场的这种反应反而使央行控制通货膨胀的工作变得稍微简单了一些。政府和家庭面临更高的利率,限制了他们增加借贷并推高价格的动力。在央行的术语中,这些“更紧缩的金融条件”限制了货币增长并抑制了价格上涨。事实上,近几个月的一个特点是货币供应量以每年 4.5 的速度适度增长。在乌克兰战争引发的价格冲击之前,英国的货币供应增长速度几乎是现在的两倍——这有助于助长随之而来的通货膨胀。这是央行今年没有效仿欧洲央行、日本银行和
澳大利亚储备银行提高利率的几个原因之一。另一家采取此路径的主要央行是美国联邦储备委员会。在凯文·沃什 (Kevin Warsh) 的新任主席领导下,美国货币政策制定者放弃了“前瞻性指引”,在此之前,他们会向金融市场提供强有力的有条件信号,告知接下来的利率政策预期。愤世嫉俗者可能会认为,这与对前瞻性指引作为政策工具的学术评估关系不大,而更多是由于白宫现任住户的不可预测性。那么,如果我们进入了一个需要自行摸索的新时代,我们应该寻找哪些可能使央行从“观望”转变为“认为必须采取行动”的信号?我认为有四点需要关注。首先是通胀预期。央行面临的尴尬现实是,自 2010 年以来,通胀率平均为 3。如果自 2004 年引入该目标以来每年都能实现 2 的通胀率,那么目前的英国价格水平将比现在低 20。目前存在显著风险——事实上证据在增加——即企业和家庭开始预期高水平的通胀。这意味着价格稳定的公信力正在丧失。即将开展的关于英国人如何应对海湾冲突引发的通胀的调查,将成为央行政策制定者的关键。其次是国际事件的作用。海湾地区的局势不可避免地将决定央行本周的货币政策报告及其政策立场。利率预期一直紧随油气价格的波动。如果与冲突相关的航运中断持续到秋季,燃料价格可能会保持高位。第三是即将到来的薪资结算影响。私营部门的薪资增长处于 2.9 的六年低点,且失业率和职位空缺数据表明劳动力市场疲软,几乎没有证据表明
工人能够谈判出击败通胀的薪资方案。尽管如此,这种情况是否会持续仍存在不确定性,尤其是在公共部门,因为政府在应对工业行动并将其公共部门薪资通胀推高至每年 5.5 之后,已经露了底牌。第四,也是最后一点,是秋季预算。关于新内阁将尝试进行多么重大的财政政策调整,仍然存在高度不确定性。这里存在一个明显的矛盾:新工党领导层大谈 40 年来最大的经济变革,但市场上的每个人都知道,他们被自己的财政规则、议会工党党团以及他们在 2024 年竞选宣言中的承诺所限制。考虑到公共政策在许多部门明确设定价格的作用,解决这一矛盾将对通胀产生影响。综合来看,这些
数据将给银行在改变政策方向(无论是调高还是调低)之前提供更多时间。这种政策稳定性,至少在目前看来,对于近年来应对了过多波动性的英国经济来说是个好消息。
Simon French 是 Panmure Liberum 的董事总经理、研究主管兼首席经济学家
克隆作品的世界里,人类 技能是我们新的黄金
每一次自动化浪潮都伴随着一个熟悉的、宣告人类技能死亡的丧钟。当机械织机出现时,织工听到了它。电子表格的兴起让银行职员感到了它。现在,据称在由 Open AI 和 Anthropic 等公司引领的大语言模型革命威胁之下的,是手工艺者、作家和财务顾问。这种阴郁的鸣响往往是过早的。这并非因为技术没有成效,而是因为价值有一种奇怪的倾向:它会集中在机器仍然无法完全掌控的事物上。人工智能可以在早餐前快速写出一千句看似合理的句子。但它无法做到的一件事是:感知到此时此刻绝对不适合大声说出真相。它可能了解事实,但它还不了解时机。这不是一个可以通过增加参数来解决的处理问题。你无法将其放入训练集中,
而这正是人类智能保持其价值的原因。我们之前看过这部电影。在 1970 年代,随着通货膨胀高企,对纸币的信心动摇,人们转向黄金。这并非因为黄金一夜之间突然变得更有用,而是因为它具有长期保值的历史。它的价格季度性地起伏,但在五年和十年的周期内,趋势一直保持上涨。如今,尽管今年以来有所回落,但金价已接近两年前的两倍。对于宝石而言,这一点更为明显。一颗无瑕的一克拉钻石的价格从 1975 年的约 $7,000 增长到 1980. 年的近 $60,000。黄金和宝石的共同点在于,没有任何政府能凭空消除其稀缺性。唐宁街总能找到增加货币供应的方法。但它无法制造出一颗上好的蓝宝石,更不能制造出那些能将原石转化为珍品的数代切割技艺。AI 对许多人类思维产出所做的事情,就像 70 年代印刷机对货币所做的那样:将曾经稀缺的东西变成了几乎不需要成本就能获得的东西。得体的散文、尚可的设计、足够的分析,所有这些都以目前低廉的成本大量生产。但正如贬值的货币并未让黄金变得毫无价值一样,这也不应让人类技能变得毫无价值。如果说有什么结论是正确的,那恰恰相反。当 AI 用“足够好”的产品充斥市场时,就是你寻找依然稀缺之物的信号:直觉、品味、卓越、判断、信任、以及稳健的技艺。购买订婚戒指从未仅仅是一次交易。没有人是在为碳晶格买单。其价值在于将情感具象化为罕见之美,因为珠宝商在无需告知的情况下就理解了需求,因为整个物件承载着电子表格无法承载的重量。手工捏制的碗、小型葡萄园的葡萄酒、记得你站姿的裁缝,同样如此。这些在本质上一直关于一个人类向另一个人类传递意义。AI 并非在与此竞争。如果说它产生了影响,那就是它让一个人类与另一个人类的互动变得更有价值。接下来的部分让我彻夜难眠:这类技能并非被储存在金库中,耐心地等待需求的回归。一位大师级工匠的判断力从未被记录在案,主要是因为无法被记录。它存在于双手之中,存在于多年的学徒生涯中,存在于被一个从事该行业 40 年的人纠正微小细节的过程中。如果不被使用,它不会安静地等待,而是会腐朽。关闭一个作坊一代人的时间,它在重新开放时,知识并不会原封不动地保留。它将从绝对的零点重新开始。戴比尔斯可以无限期地仓储钻石,等待市场转机。但没有人能够仓储一项濒临灭绝的行业。需要保护的东西很简单,但执行起来却更难。几十年后,一个国家的真正财富将不仅仅由训练的模型数量或购买的 AI 芯片数量来衡量。它将取决于该国是否费心让其作坊和学徒制存续足够长的时间,以便在这一切之中
仍然重要。这不是出于感性,而是因为稀缺性决定了价格。这一点我们已经学习过不止一次了。这一次,在我们再次被教训之前,应当记住以往技术突破带来的教训。
查理·普拉格内尔 (Charlie Pragnell) 是 Pragnell 珠宝店的主席,该店是一家第六代家族经营的珠宝商
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唐卡斯特谢菲尔德 (Doncaster Sheffield) 机场在计划重新开放之前,正向外界推介其作为军事货运和武器区域枢纽的资质,旨在利用预期中国防开支增加的机遇(Guy Taylor 报道)。该机场位于南约克郡的前 RAF Finningley 机场,拥有悠久的军事历史,包括在第一次世界大战期间作为皇家飞行军团的基地以击退德国齐柏林飞艇。
它还拥有英国最长且最宽的单跑道之一,该跑道在冷战期间专为 Avro Vulcan 等远程核武装轰炸机而设计。
唐卡斯特谢菲尔德机场在 2022 年关闭,此前其私人运营商 Peel Group 认为该机场在财务上不可行。
重启工作得到了唐卡斯特市议会和南约克郡市长 Oliver Coppard 的支持,货运航班目前计划于明年恢复,客运航班则从 2028 年开始。
“对于任何拥有我们这种规模跑道的机场,我们已经并正继续与国防部进行对话,”计划总监 Christian Foster 表示。
Frasers 推动任命 Murray 为 Hugo Boss 首席执行官
Isabella Fish 零售编辑 一家位于西约克郡的楼梯升降机公司向其居住在摩纳哥的创始人支付了 £50 million 的股息,使其在过去 12 年中的总派息额超过 £350 million。
Acorn Mobility Services 总部位于布拉德福德附近的一个商业园区,由 John Jakes 在 1990 年代初创立。由于人口老龄化带来的需求增长以及海外扩张,其销售额有所提升。
根据最近提交给公司注册处 (Companies House) 的账目显示,在营收为 £288.9 million(相比 2024 年的 £267.5 million)的情况下,税前利润从 £57.8 million 增长至 £63.3 million。
销售额中包括 £44.1 million 的服务收入。截至 9 月的年度申报股息从前一年的 £44.8 million 增长至 £50.4 million。
根据账目,70 岁的 Jakes 是一名定居于摩纳哥的英国国民,是该公司董事并持有 Acorn 100 per cent 的所有权。
在今年的《星期日泰晤士报》富豪榜中,他的财富估值为 £926 million,增加了 £57 million,排名第 170 位。
Jakes 保持低调。一名熟悉他的商人将其描述为一名“非常难以捉摸的人”。他在 1992 年创立了该公司,起初从事二手楼梯升降机的维修工作。
Frasers Group 正在探索将 Michael Murray 安置为 Hugo Boss 首席执行官的方法,旨在试图加强对这家德国时尚品牌的控制。
这家由 Mike Ashley 拥有的零售集团在过去几年中通过购入 Hugo Boss 的大量股份,试图对其在 Flannels 和 Frasers 商店中销售的该品牌施加影响。
上周,Frasers 将其在该时尚品牌中的持股比例提升至 30 per cent 以上,超过了根据德国法规触发强制收购要约的门槛。
消息人士告诉《泰晤士报》,Frasers 正在为将 Murray 推举为 Hugo Boss 的首席执行官奠定基础。
Murray 是 Ashley 的女婿,目前担任 Frasers 的首席执行官,并试图通过进军奢侈品零售业来提升该集团的高端定位。
推动 Murray 出任首席执行官符合 Frasers 的标志性操作模式,该策略曾在 2024 年底被部署,当时该公司试图任命 Ashley 为在线零售商 Boohoo 的首席执行官。
Frasers 曾悄悄建立起主要-
Christian Foster 表示,关于这座在第一次世界大战期间曾作为基地的机场未来的讨论已经升级
负责监督该项目的相关人员表示。 随着地缘政治波动促使各国政府优先考虑军事支出,过去一年中相关的讨论已经升级。
这些讨论包括该机场如何被用于运输武器和关键基础设施(如坦克和军用车辆),甚至包括人员。
“关于军事的另一个方面是考虑北约和美国的防空系统,以及机场如何”
Michael Murray 是 Frasers 的首席执行官,也是 Mike Ashley 的女婿
的持股比例,使其成为 Boohoo 最大的单一投资者。一旦持有足够权重,它便利用该地位要求董事会进行变更。
这家 Sports Direct 的所有者于上月发起了收购要约。该集团表示,它相信增加持股将“为 Frasers 的股东创造价值”。
然而,Hugo Boss 敦促股东拒绝这项价值 £1.7 billion 的收购方案,并称该方案低估了品牌价值。这家时尚公司表示,Frasers 提出以每股 €38.00 现金收购其尚未持有的 74 per cent 股份,从财务角度来看是“不足的”。
视角”。Frasers 表示,收购该品牌将“为 Frasers 的股东创造价值”。
Hugo Boss 成立于 1924 年,全球销售额超过 €4.2 billion。由于正面临品牌认知混乱、全球对正装的需求下降以及服装市场整体增速放缓的挑战,该公司目前正在进行转型。
该公司最初生产通用服装,但在战后开始专注于男装西装。它于 1988 年上市。自 2021 年起,该公司由前 Tommy Hilfiger 负责人 Daniel Grieder 领导。
Frasers 的最新干预发生在 Murray 去年 5 月正式被任命为 Hugo Boss 监事会成员之后。如果 Frasers 收购该业务,这将是其迄今为止最大的一笔交易。该零售集团旗下的品牌包括 House of Fraser、Evans Cycles 和 Jack Wills。
去年,Frasers 警告称,它将投票反对 Hugo Boss 未来任何形式的股息支付。该零售集团表示,它认为 Hugo Boss 的股价被“低估”,且这家在法兰克福 Xetra 证券交易所上市的公司应优先提高其市场估值,而非向股东返还现金。
Frasers 拒绝置评。
支持其他军事 国家”,他说道,指的是在伊朗战争期间对塞浦路斯皇家空军 (RAF) 基地的使用。 “你们已经有北约喷气机、美国喷气机在飞往我们的机场了。”
由于牛津郡的 RAF Brize Norton 基地因“必要”的重新铺设和改良工程而暂时关闭,区域枢纽增加军事能力的理由可能会进一步增强。
全力打造 新反应堆
Emma Powell
一家总部位于曼彻斯特、从 BAE Systems 分拆出来的公司已筹集首批 £15 million 资金,用于开发首个采用燃气轮机技术的核反应堆,承诺将使核电部署速度更快、生产成本更低。
此次融资由风投公司 IQ Capital 领投,是 Nuclear Turbines 自去年 10 月从这家 FTSE 100 国防巨头中分拆以来首次融资,将用于资助该技术的详细设计工作。
该设计采用高温轮机技术取代了蒸汽轮机系统,这种技术通常见于喷气发动机和燃气电厂。该公司表示,该技术可用于为工业设施、数据中心和制造工厂等关键基础设施供电。
Nuclear Turbines 联合创始人 Jeremy Owston 表示:“行业内一直以来是先设计反应堆,然后才考虑如何处理热量。我们反其道而行之:我们从最廉价的发电方式入手,并设计了与之匹配的反应堆。”
Owston 曾任 BAE 首席工程师,他与联合创始人 Tim Abram 教授声称,由于占地面积大幅缩小,显著降低了建设成本,该技术产生的电费仅为传统蒸汽核电站成本的五分之一。
政府旨在增加电网中的核电量,并选择罗尔斯-罗伊斯 (Rolls-Royce) 来建造该国首批小型模块化反应堆。这些反应堆中,首个预计将于 2034, 年投入运行,被视为一种具有成本效益且更快速的增加核电供应的方式,可以在间歇性可再生能源并入系统时提供基荷。
在两年后二手产品难以采购时,他转向自行生产。他的儿子 James, 38, 是一名赛车手,当 James 在美国的 IndyCar 系列赛中比赛时,Acorn 为其提供了赞助。
Acorn 制造、销售、安装并维护楼梯升降机,并表示其产品有助于老年人和行动不便者更长时间地留在家中。
根据其网站,该公司在约克郡和苏格兰设有工厂,产品出口到 80 多个国家。
员工总数从 1,400 人增加到去年的 1,529 人。
Acorn 表示 2025 年是“成功的一年”,销售额受益于“可选产品配置提高了平均售价”。公司补充道:“毛利率为 73.7 per cent,而前一年为 74.6 per cent,虽然基本持平,但受到了材料定价和劳动力成本增加的影响。”
为了在关税税率上涨前交付商品,该公司增加了约 £3 million 的库存。
其三分之一的销售额产生于英国,14 per cent 来自欧洲其他地区,其余来自世界其他地方。该公司在美国、加拿大、澳大利亚和南非以及欧洲最大的经济体中设有子公司。
已联系 Acorn 寻求评论。
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T entrepreneurs network compliance
在复杂的职场世界中,政府新成立的劳动力市场薪酬与权利执法机构试图让事情变得简单。公平工作局(Fair Work Agency)首席执行官 Lisa Pinney 表示,该机构每天都会问自己两个问题。第一个是:“我们如何将欠个人的钱追回来?”第二个是:“我们如何确保采取法律行动以防止这种情况再次发生?”简而言之,这就是该机构自今年 4 月根据工党的《就业权利法案》成立以来一直在做的事情。
上周,在收到关于工作和生活条件恶劣的报告后,该机构 650 人的团队成员与其它政府机构一起访问了苏格兰的一家水果农场。报告中提到的问题包括:安置工人的大篷车内鼠患严重、薪资和工作时间存在不一致,以及工作时间过长。部分受影响的员工是通过英国季节性工作签证计划工作的外国公民。农场主在访问后已经进行了改进。
如果企业在发现薪资、病假工资或假期工资支付不足的问题后能如实交代并补齐欠款,则可以避免被执法行动。而被抓到违规的雇主可能会被罚款——并且会被公开点名谴责。智库 Resolution Foundation 估计,每年有 900,000 名工人的部分假期工资被扣除,总欠款额约为 £2.1 billion。低薪委员会(Low Pay Commission)估计,2024. 年约有 371,000 人获得的薪资低于国家最低工资标准。
该机构还调查剥削工人的行为,包括现代奴隶制,并有权开出民事罚单、协商具有法律约束力的承诺书、申请禁止董事任职,以及建议对雇主提起公诉。它经常与警方以及适当的起诉机构(如英格兰和威尔士的皇家检控署)合作。
Pinney 对工人权利意识的“进一步增强”以及该机构在推动咨询量大幅增加方面所起的作用表示赞赏。该机构的劳工虐待部门在今年第一季度处理了 2,741 起咨询,同比增长 87%。同期,关于国家最低工资的咨询量增长了 19%,达到 2,933 起。
Pinney 于 4 月就任首席执行官,此前她曾担任矿业修复管理局(Mining Remediation Authority)的负责人,该机构负责监管矿山安全及其环境影响。在那之前,她曾在环境署(Environment Agency)担任高级管理人员。
她向雇主推销的方案是“胡萝卜加大棒”。她说:“我们希望工人知道自己的权利以及如何获得支持。我们希望企业感到合规更简单、更容易实现,并且他们得到了公正对待。同时,我们希望通过能够对那些企图剥削工人或削弱合法企业竞争力的人采取强有力的行动,来支持这一点。”
该机构正与咨询与争议解决机构 Acas 合作,为企业创建一个“清晰得多”的数字化门户,以帮助他们应对雇佣人员方面的挑战。行业团体对某些情况表示了担忧……
Lisa Pinney 领导工党的公平工作局
新的就业权利将如何在实践中运作以及如何执行。
招聘与就业联合会 (Recruitment and Employment Confederation) 支持该机构的成立,并对其协助雇主的承诺以及采取果断行动的保证感到鼓舞。但该联合会也在寻求基于风险的执法。
“寻找那些存在无意错误或轻微违规的领域很容易,但真正重要的是找到那些可能并不那么显眼的违规运营商,”该联合会首席标准官洛林·拉里亚 (Lorraine Laryea) 表示。
皮尼 (Pinney) 表示,当政府决定该机构开始负责监管假期薪酬和病假薪酬的日期时,该机构将对其执法方式保持透明。
“不会出现这种情况,即我们突然说‘这项权力明天生效——我们马上就到你门口’,”她说道。
虽然在掌握有严重违法行为情报的情况下,该机构将与国家犯罪调查局 (National Crime Agency) 等机构合作,对雇主采取秘密行动,但其首选方式是提前向雇主发出预告。
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[[IMG_XXXX]] 代理机构。下方为招聘与就业联合会 (Recruitment and Employment Confederation) 的洛林·拉里亚 (Lorraine Laryea),该联合会对该机构表示支持。
“我们更希望支持并使企业能够进行审查,采取正确行动,做出任何必要的改变,”皮尼 (Pinney) 表示。“我们意识到大多数企业都希望做正确的事。我们也意识到人们会犯错。”
该机构取代了就业代理标准监察局 (Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate) 和帮工与劳工滥用管理局 (Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority),后两者的年度预算总额为 £47 million。新机构的预算为 £60 million,并将与国家最低工资合规团队共同开展工作。
其权力还包括对未支付就业审裁庭裁决金或 Acas 和解金的雇主处以罚款。它还可以代表个人提起就业审裁庭诉讼,并在民事案件中提供法律援助。
皮尼在幕后正忙于将目前组成其机构的不同团队和系统整合在一起,同时与能够帮助该组织履行其职能的合作伙伴进行沟通。
这些合作伙伴包括监管社会护理提供者的护理质量委员会 (Care Quality Commission) —— 它是该机构重点关注的两个领域之一,另一个是建筑业。英国的现金交易“灰色经济”(包括手工洗车店和美甲店等活动)也处于审查之中。
皮尼已经开始
有时候,职衔变得不再重要,你只需卷起袖子干就对了
与公司注册处 (Companies House)、英国税务海关总署 (HMRC) 以及破产管理服务局 (Insolvency Service) 展开讨论,以寻找打击不法董事的方法。这些董事将公司置于接管状态,逃避支付未结工资、税款和其他账单,然后重新启动相同的业务 —— 这种现象被称为“凤凰公司” (phoenixing)。
向公平工作局 (Fair Work Agency) 举报的人员包括“举报者”雇主,他们向该机构提供有关其他公司不良行为的线索。“我们鼓励企业和其他人士,如果他们认为其行业内存在行为不当的情况,请告知我们,”皮尼说。
在对违法公司进行“点名羞辱” (naming and shaming) 方面,该机构将继续针对未能支付最低工资或未支付就业审裁庭裁决金的公司采取此类措施。去年 10 月,近 500 家雇主因未能支付最低工资被罚款超过 £10 million,其中 42,000 名员工共收到 £6 million。这些公司包括英国天然气公司 (British Gas) 的母公司 Centrica、Cineworld 以及 Holland & Barrett。
皮尼表示,她对于将此举扩展到其他领域(如假期工资和病假工资)持开放态度。“这确实能推动变革,”她说。
如需向公平工作局反映问题,请发送电子邮件至: contact@fairworkagency.gov.uk
6 请访问 Times Entrepreneurs Network 网站,获取面向企业家和商业领袖的每日新闻、见解与灵感
身陷泥潭: 商业生活的 真实写照
亚当·索弗 (Adam Sopher)
如果你在经营生意时正经历一个糟糕的月份,你可能会在打开 LinkedIn 时产生一种感觉,怀疑自己到底哪里做错了。每个人似乎都赢了。营收在增长。新合同在签署。团队在繁荣。奖项在收集。显然,英国的每家企业都正处于史上最辉煌的一年。坦白说,我也曾是其中之一。像大多数创始人和首席执行官一样,我过去发布的是 Joe & Seph’s 的胜利:令人兴奋的新客户、最新的美食爆米花口味发布、团队的伟大成就。但我极少发布的是:美食爆米花在仓库里融化了。这就是本专栏的目的。“身陷泥潭”是一个探讨经营企业真实情况的地方。不是经过润色的版本,也不是在会议舞台上的版本。而是那个你试图让自己看起来像天鹅一样平静且掌控全局,而实际上在水面下疯狂划水的版本。不要误会。我们的团队今年取得了一些令人难以置信的成就,我对我们所建立的一切以及我们正在完成的业务转型感到非常自豪。但每个创始人知道,总有那么一些时刻,首席执行官的头衔变得毫无意义,你只能卷起袖子,处理掉落在你收件箱里的任何危机。上周就是一个完美的例子。周一始于我们持续进行的租金审查谈判。我们的 Joe & Seph’s Popcorn 总部(我们的产品制造地)位于伦敦西区帕克罗亚尔 (Park Royal) 一个租赁的 27,000 平方英尺场地内。从历史上看,该地区以食品生产和制造业著称。如今,这里越来越多地成为了巨大的数据中心和住宅开发项目的聚集地。结果如何?过去五年中,商业租金实际上翻了一番。我实际上计算过,在那段时间里,成为我们建筑的房东会比创办并启动我们的业务更获利。他们从我们这里赚取的租金以及物业的估值增长是惊人的。为了应对这次租金上涨,像许多企业一样,我们不得不重新审视我们的计划。招聘被推迟,新产品的投资放缓,我们不得不优先考虑销售增长。到周二,我参加了精彩的《泰晤士报》企业家现场 (Times Entrepreneurs Live) 活动,享受了一个难得的远离运营问题的日子。这时我的手机震动了:仓库的空调无法应对热浪,我们爆米花的手工焦糖涂层开始融化。管理教科书中几乎没有涉及“爆米花紧急保鲜”的商业问题,但我们运营团队的 Microsoft Teams 聊天群迅速被各种昂贵的最后一刻空调供应商建议给刷屏了。周三带来了另一个提醒:全球事件总能以某种方式影响你的损益表。几只将我们的产品运往中东的海运集装箱因地区冲突而受到干扰,最终在计划外绕道,停靠在斯里兰卡和印度,直到另一艘船能将它们运往海湾地区。事实证明,这相当昂贵。周四是我犯错打开 LinkedIn 的日子。一条接一条的帖子在庆祝创纪录的增长、令人兴奋的机会和无尽的成功故事。在经历了一番……
刷了几分钟后,我删掉了这个应用程序。随后周五到了,我们的包装合规服务商发来提醒,称最新的报告截止日期快到了。对于那些足够幸运而对此并不了解的人来说,这意味着需要提交过去六个月内销售的每一件包装(作为我们产品的一部分)的详细数量信息,并按材料类型、可回收性、重量以及一系列其他要求进行分类。我真的有一名团队成员坐在办公室里,称量着包裹在我们的美食爆米花周围的纸套,以及密封一个箱子所使用的胶带量。自然地,这件事正好发生在我们的供应链团队实施一套新库存控制系统之时。时机真是完美。然而,这些挑战并非绝无仅有。每个企业主都会有一个属于自己的类似故事。不同的行业,不同的产品,不同的问题,但感觉是一样的。一次意外的成本增加。一个供应商问题。一个监管截止日期。一个客户问题。在最糟糕的时刻出故障——这就是一线战斗的生活。所以,如果你正处于这样一个似乎没有什么能按计划进行的一周,你并不孤单。在每一个“一切都太棒了”的帖子背后,通常是一个创始人正在悄悄处理一个别人看不见的问题。我现在打算不再那么悄悄地做了。如果你在自己的业务经营中也有一段精彩的“战争故事”,请发送给我们。我们可能会在未来的刊号中精选一些最精彩的故事。毕竟,不幸的人总希望能找到共鸣——尤其是当对方手里还有融化的爆米花时。
Monday July 27 2026 | 泰晤士报 商业
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12个月最高和最低价 英国股票和投资信托的最高/最低价基于盘中数据。
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市值 股价 (百万) 公司 (便士) +/- 股息% 市盈率 周度
Markets LLC. 保留所有权利。 禁止重新分发;
Tradeweb FTSE 国债收盘价
此处包含的信息为 Tradeweb 的专有财产;不得复制;且不保证其准确、完整或及时;且不构成投资建议。Tradeweb 对因使用此信息而可能导致的任何损失或损害不承担责任。
39 商业
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基准利率 清算银行: 3.75%
欧洲央行再融资利率 2.40%
美联储基金利率 3.5-3.75%
Halifax 抵押贷款利率 (SVR) 7.24%
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泰晤士报 | Monday July 27 2026 41 登记册
David Austin
1967, 当大卫·奥斯汀 (David Austin) 九岁时,他的一次经历可能为其日后对待业务的严谨态度铺平了道路。当时,他是伍尔弗汉普顿附近比彻菲尔德预备学校的一名日间学生,且已在名单上准备进入其父亲的母校——什鲁布里学校就读;他的父亲同样名叫大卫·奥斯汀,是一名涉足月季培育的农民。然而,奥斯汀父此时刚刚破产,这意味着孩子们必须缩减私立教育。奥斯汀与他的姐姐和弟弟都被送到了特尔福德的亚伯拉罕·达比综合学校。年幼的奥斯汀从容应对了境遇的改变,将当时被称呼的名字——朱利安 (Julian)——改为大卫 (David),以听起来不那么中产阶级,并在学业和体育方面取得了成功。随后,他在新成立的索尔福德大学完成了商业研究学位。
他的父亲最终在 20 世纪 80 年代获得了财务上的成功,他创立了“大卫·奥斯汀月季” (David Austin Roses),培育出被其营销为“英国月季”的新品种。这些品种旨在将“老式”灌木月季的特性、香气和丰满之美,与现代杂交茶香月季的抗病性和重复开花特性相结合,而后者在数十年间一直是园丁们唯一能选择的主流品种。色彩是另一个重要考量,经典灌木月季通常呈现较柔和的粉色、黄色和乳白色,而 20 世纪 50 年代和 60 年代的丰花月季和杂交茶香月季则色调浓郁,有时甚至过于艳丽。在筛选新月季时,“魅力与优雅”是模糊的口号,奥斯汀以及经营公司的第三代——他的儿子理查德 (Richard)、詹姆斯 (James) 和女儿奥利维亚 (Olivia) 都坚守这一准则。
月季的命名是另一个重要因素;奥斯汀父对英国文学的热爱,使得一系列花卉以托马斯·哈迪 (Thomas Hardy) 和丁尼森勋爵 (Lord Tennyson) 作品中的人物命名,例如“尤斯塔西亚·法伊” (Eustacia Vye) 和“夏洛特女士” (Lady of Shalott)。公司对此的态度多年来有所变化——在今年的切尔西花展上推出的最新品种名为“大卫·贝克汉姆爵士” (Sir David Beckham)。
大卫·朱利安·查尔斯·奥斯汀出生于 1958. 他的父亲是一位诗人,并撰写了多部关于月季的书籍;而他的母亲帕特 (Pat) 是一位雕塑家,曾在花园的大帐篷里雕刻石头。他们的生活方式非常波西米亚,奥斯汀和他的两个兄弟姐妹在什罗普郡阿尔布赖顿的农场苗圃中几乎自由生长,他们驾驶拖拉机,用干草垛搭建秘密基地,并与大群动物为伴。他们在五岁左右时每人都分到了一块蔬菜地,在青少年时期,奥斯汀通过在田里除草来赚取额外的零用钱。他自己并没有成为一名专家级的月季育种师,但后来将他的商业头脑和营销专业知识带到了公司,特别是在切花生产领域。他的姐姐克莱尔 (Claire) 在 20 世纪 80 年代和 90 年代期间就职于大卫·奥斯汀月季公司,随后创办了自己的成功苗圃。
奥斯汀的月季中有一款是以国王命名的,该品种在去年的 RHS 切尔西花展上赠予了其同名者。
商业,而他的兄弟詹姆斯是约克大学的计算机科学教授,他协助创建了公司的第一个零售网站,在当时被认为具有开创性。他们的母亲则设计了公司的标志。
大学毕业后,在 1979 年,奥斯汀加入了家族企业,但时间并不长。当时,办公室是一个位于苗圃中心的拥挤的便携式房车(Portakabin)。奥斯汀住在现场的一座小屋里,每天热切地阅读《金融时报》,并计划取得会计师资格,以助力他成为企业家的梦想。当时公司仍难以产生影响力,奥斯汀后来承认,他觉得这段经历枯燥且缺乏挑战。
他的女友(后来的妻子)弗朗西妮(Francine)他在 1980 年与其相识,她出身于珠宝商业家庭,次年他们开了一家珠宝店,后来发展成了连锁店。第一家店位于新开业的特尔福德购物中心(Telford Shopping Centre),它打破了传统模式,取消了带有门铃的锁闭前门。在 20 世纪 80 年代中期,大卫·奥斯汀珠宝店(David Austin Jewellers)在西米德兰兹郡又开设了五家分店。
包括杰拉尔德·拉特纳(Gerald Ratner)的廉价连锁店扩张在内的商业压力,导致该创业项目在 1993 年告终,而奥斯汀在 1990 年便回到了家族企业。到这一阶段,苗圃业务已经有了相当大的发展。奥斯汀对公司的主要贡献在于,他意识到切花是一个未被开发的市场,至少在他公司培育的那些花卉种类中是这样。花店的花束和胸花通常卷曲得很紧,缺乏香味和个性,因为它们主要是为了耐用性和运输便利而培育的。奥斯汀设想推出一系列高端切花玫瑰,它们保留了公司销售的园艺植物的许多特性,但能承受长途运输,并拥有显著的“瓶插期”。
老奥斯汀最初并不认可儿子关于扩张的计划,这导致了一些激烈的争论——尽管通常关系良好,但他们的纽带是由对伍尔弗汉普顿流浪者足球俱乐部(Wolverhampton Wanderers)共同的痴迷所锻造的。奥斯汀拥有季票,并将一种玫瑰品种命名为“Molineux”,以俱乐部的主场命名。
切花业务随后成为了大卫·奥斯汀玫瑰公司(David Austin Roses)的一个盈利部门,每年销售约 600 万枝。另一个由奥斯汀发起的关键业务领域是将盆栽玫瑰批发给园艺中心,这通过建设大型冷库建筑以及租用邻近农民的土地得以实现。
然而,奥斯汀重新加入公司后的首要任务是国际销售。他周游世界与各苗圃商洽谈许可协议——专利权的执行仍然是公司活动中一个重要但低调的方面。大卫·奥斯汀玫瑰在 40 多个国家销售。
ANDREW MAYBURY; OLIVER DIXON/SHUTTERSTOCK
在美国和日本设有办公室,2024 年的营业额略低于 £30 million。
奥斯汀还扩大了公司的营销部门,并确保目录、网络和广告中的玫瑰摄影达到高标准,而这在苗圃贸易中通常并非(且目前仍非)普遍情况。
最重要的是,奥斯汀继承了其父亲开创的营销理念,即他们的“英国玫瑰”是独特且特殊的,因此能够支撑比大多数竞争对手更高的价格。然而,生产成本相近,这从而带来了更高的利润。而能够背书“英国玫瑰”这一术语的唯一权威机构仅为公司本身,这一点似乎从未造成影响。
奥斯汀始终谨慎,不对追求的“完美”目标做出绝对主张,而是坦诚地对待某些植物的缺陷。当他的表亲、花园设计师巴尼·吉尼斯 (Bunny Guinness) 向他暗示某些大卫·奥斯汀玫瑰可能会“永恒绽放”时,他平静地回答道:“有的会,有的不会。”
在设计师乔·汤普森 (Jo Thompson) 十余年地恳请公司重新推出经典的“芒斯特伍德” (Munstead Wood) 玫瑰之后,他最终解释说,虽然这是一种美丽的花朵,但植物本身不够稳定。奥斯汀表示,他认为自己的职责是为客户提供一致的品质。(他在一定程度上妥协了,目前该品种已小规模重新上市,但附带了关于其易感病的严厉免责声明。)
挑选新花卉的 准则
奥斯汀与他的父亲共同工作,直到其父亲于 2018 年去世。随后他接任董事长,尽管在之前的几十年里,他实际上已经在经营这家公司。他在距离奥尔布赖顿 (Albrighton) 几英里远的地方居住,在 2007 年结束一段婚姻后,与第二任妻子佩妮 (Penny) 共同建立了一个家以及一座花园。
在公司利润方面,他有着敏锐的节俭意识。有一次,在德国的一场花卉展收拾行装时,奥斯汀爬进一个大型垃圾桶,用脚踩实里面的物品,以避免租用另一个垃圾桶的费用,这让同事们大为惊讶。他是一名热衷于高尔夫球的爱好者,并收藏了一些经典车型,重点是保时捷。他曾志愿在专业车库工作,以增加自己的机械知识;当被问到 60 岁生日希望员工赠送什么礼物时,他要求了一套专业标准的工具箱。
奥斯汀为人随和,说话轻柔,乐于与任何人交谈,但在商业事务上,他依然拥有某种敏锐的杀手本能。据他的家人称,每当他们玩大富翁游戏时,他总是赢家。
42 2026年7月27日 星期一 | the times 讣告 埃德温·乔维特爵士 (Sir Edwin Jowitt)
埃德温·乔维特爵士在面对被告时告诉他们,一起种族动机的杀人案必然是最严重的杀人案之一。他补充道:“你们合谋武装自己,并计划袭击一个你们偶然发现的无辜之人,仅仅因为他与你们的种族不同。”
乔维特作为高等法院法官,主持了一起涉及帮派谋杀罗斯·帕克案的审判。罗斯·帕克是一名白人青少年,于 2001 年在彼得伯勒 (Peterborough) 被一群巴基斯坦裔男子杀害。帕克在与女友散步时遭到袭击,当时正值纽约 9 月 11 日袭击后的紧张局势之中。乔维特判处了沉重的刑期:他谴责了该犯罪行为的残暴性质,将其描述为“懦弱且毫无意义”,且是由种族仇恨驱动的,并驳回了关于谋杀并非出于种族动机的辩护。他判处主犯终身监禁,最低刑期为 15 至 18 年。
他在 2002 年对该审判的坚定处理因其对证据的清晰聚焦而赢得赞誉。当时他已退休两年,但仍偶尔在高等法院出庭。鉴于此案的敏感性,此前曾任巡回法官和伯明翰记录员 (recorder of Birmingham) 的乔维特成为了一个显而易见的人选。曾与乔维特在律师事务所共事、现已退休的上诉法院法官约翰·戈尔德林爵士 (Sir John Goldring) 表示:“他细致、精准,是一位非常、非常出色的刑事法官。”
这并非唯一一次他的司法技能被渴求。2004 年,乔维特是被选中领导北爱尔兰三起争议性杀人案调查的三名法官之一。在他的案例中,
喜剧女演员,伍迪·艾伦的灵感缪斯,她在《玛丽·哈特曼》(Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman) 中演绎了美国 70 年代中期的神经质状态
当露易丝·拉瑟遇到伍迪·艾伦时,她正是一个处于精神崩溃边缘的年轻女性。随后,这位年轻演员兼歌手的生活就像这位导演执导的一部美味的曼哈顿浪漫喜剧般展开——在中央公园漫步,伴随着连珠炮般的俏皮话和电影典故;前往阴暗且带有波希米亚风格的唱片店朝圣,他在那里为她买到了比莉·荷莉戴 (Billie Holiday) 的《Lady Day》;或者在广场酒店外的喷泉边会面,以此向 F·斯科特·菲茨杰拉 ld (F Scott Fitzgerald) 致敬。艾伦本人回忆道,他是一见钟情,并在早期约会的眩晕感中,想象自己“摆出像蒙哥马利·克里夫特 (Montgomery Clift) 那样沉思的姿态”。
“她名字里的 L 音是由舌尖形成的,这立刻就带有一种性暗示。S 音也同样诱人,”艾伦在他的自传《关于没什么》(Apropos of Nothing) 中写道。“她是个金发美女,眼睛大而圆。她迷人,极其聪明,反应快,非常幽默且风趣……她的声音厚实,每一个毛孔都透出肉欲的承诺。她也有一点疯癫,因为上帝在祂白色长袍的天国袖口里藏着各种下作的把戏。”
从本质上讲,拉瑟是艾伦在 1970 年的《拿钱快跑》(Take the Money and Run) 和 1971, 的《香蕉》(Bananas) 等电影中那种古灵精怪的喜剧风格的完美缪斯,用她超凡脱俗的古怪与他焦虑的冗词相匹配。在现实生活中,此时艾伦正与黛安·基顿 (Diane Keaton) 约会,他与拉瑟为期四年的婚姻已经结束。两人仍保持朋友关系。1972 年,拉瑟在《关于性,你想知道的一切 (但不敢问)》中饰演一名只能在公共场所达到高潮的女性。
拉瑟后来表示,艾伦教给她最重要的一课就是仅仅
是对罗伯特·哈米尔 (Robert Hamill) 谋杀案的调查。哈米尔是一名 19 岁的天主教徒,1997. 年 4 月在阿马省 (Co Armagh) 的波塔当 (Portadown) 被忠诚派成员踢至死亡。他主持了一个专家小组,举行了广泛的公开听证会,听取了 130 多名证人的证词。
由于他决定拒绝前皇家阿尔斯特警察局 (RUC) 警员的匿名请求,并强迫他们在不遮挡面部的情况下作证,他面临了一些批评和法律挑战。他的决定得到了上议院的维持。
乔威特 (Jowitt) 的最终报告于 2011, 年 2 月完成,共五卷,耗资 £33 百万。据称,调查未发现 RUC 警员与袭击的忠诚派凶手之间存在蓄意勾结的证据,但强调了多项系统性失效,导致杀戮在未受制约的情况下发生,并破坏了对嫌疑人的起诉。法律程序推迟了最终报告的公布,目前计划在之后
因紧张而感到 “身体不适”
年度夏季议会休会期。 埃德温·弗兰克·乔维特 (Edwin Frank Jowitt) 1929. 出生于德比郡里普利的三个男孩之一。他的父亲弗兰克是一名工程师,母亲温妮弗雷德 (Winifred,原姓 Hunt) 是一名女商人。他就读于斯旺威克大厅文法学校 (Swanwick Hall Grammar School),随后在伦敦政治经济学院学习法律,获得法学学士学位 (LLB)。当他
Lasser 与伍迪·艾伦 (Woody Allen) 合作,两人从 1966 到 1970. 期间结婚四年。右上图,在《玛丽·哈特曼,玛丽·哈特曼》中饰演同名角色。
做她自己。“他说,‘我做的是笑话,而你的喜剧是态度’。” 从 1976, 年 1 月起 18 个月的时间里,Lasser 正是这么做的。在讽刺肥皂剧《玛丽·哈特曼,玛丽·哈特曼》(Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman) 中饰演主角,Lasser 成为了美国神经质的化身,该剧每周播出五晚,在全国范围内同步播映。她饰演一名住在俄亥俄州的神经质家庭主妇,在看到广告后疑惑为什么她买的产品没能去除油毡地板上蜡黄色的污渍。通过超现实的转折,屋外响起了警笛,因为有一名杀手在逃,她的祖父因露体被捕,而一名邻居
乔维特被认为是一位细致 且具有独立思考能力的法官
14 他的母亲的一位朋友说,他有一张像大律师一样的舌头;在他母亲看来,这就是他法律野心的开端。他于 1951 年被接纳进入法庭 (中殿法院)。 1959 年,他与护士安妮·芭芭拉·戴森 (Anne Barbara Dyson) 结婚。她于 2008. 年去世。他们住在北安普敦郡的德斯伯勒 (Desborough),在那里抚养了五个孩子,其中两人从事法律工作:瑞秋 (Rachel) 是一名治疗咨询师;西蒙 (Simon) 是一名艺术家和教师;艾玛 (Emma) 是一名护士;马修 (Matthew) 是泽西岛的总检察长;贾斯汀 (Justin) 是一名城中律师。 乔维特一生都是虔诚的罗马天主教徒,同时也拥有幽默感
在她给他端去的一碗汤里淹死了。“我觉得她就像一个在一个可能不值得生存的世界中生存下来的幸存者,你懂吗,” Lasser 用她那慵懒的声音说道。 这部剧是对消费社会幻想的讽刺,而当时美国正处于越战和水门事件后依然震惊的残酷现实之中。由于 Lasser 长期与心理健康问题作斗争,她为角色增添了额外的真实感,并通过穿着一件古怪的玩偶般格子裙、泡泡袖,再加上红色假发和她标志性的双马尾,来传递更多的疯狂。讽刺并非美国电视的强项
并且会为家人表演节目。这包括其中一个人在门几乎关闭时握住他的手,这样他就看不见了。他会穿着一件背心和一件夹克,然后想方设法地重新出现,此时背心却套在了夹克外面。山岳行走是他极大的热情所在,骑行也是如此:在晚年身体状况不太稳定时,他开始骑三轮车。
在法庭上,他是一位出色的盘问者,加入了位于 2 Crown Office Row 的律师事务所(同事包括 Geoffrey Lane 和 Igor Judge,两人后来都成为了首席大法官)。Hacking 回忆道:“他是一位卓越的辩护律师,也是一位谨慎且才华横溢的盘问者。后来得知他在出庭前必须克服紧张情绪,这令人惊讶。他描述说当时身体感到不适。” Jowitt 主要在 Midland 巡回法庭发展出了成功的刑事执业经验,在 1969 年成为王室律师(taking silk),1972 年成为王室法院记录员,1980 年起担任巡回法官直到 1987 年,随后从 1987 年到 1988 年担任伯明翰的高级巡回法官兼记录员。
作为一名法官,他被认为坚定且公正,倾向于老派的严厉,而非后来那种更现代、更友好的方式。他不容忍愚蠢,并要求法律顾问必须做好充分准备。他在高级巡回法官任上的广泛认可,促使他在 1988 年被晋升至高等法院法官,并在那里任职直到 2000 年。这次晋升对他本人来说是个惊喜(尽管对他人而言并非如此);他会谦虚地说,他从未想过这会发生。
1991 年,他主持了 Frank Beck 的审判,后者被指控在莱斯特郡儿童中心实施系统性儿童虐待。
GETTY IMAGES; SHUTTERSTOCK
七十年代的喜剧 许多人认为 诺曼·里尔 (Norman Lear) 的系列剧 超越了时代。 “当她为我读了一段剧本后,我几乎喜极而泣,” 里尔回忆道。 “路易丝带来的特质 就像紧身胸衣一样 完美契合玛丽·哈特曼 (Mary Hartman) 这个角色。” 路易丝·拉瑟 (Louise Lasser) 凭借她那双下垂的大眼睛和憨傻的笑容,登上了《新闻周刊》(Newsweek)、《人物》(People) 和《滚石》(Rolling Stone) 的封面,但在 18 个月内录制 325 集的压力让她精疲力竭。她因持有可卡因而被捕,两个月后的 1976 年 7 月,她在素描喜剧节目《周六夜现场》(Saturday Night Live) 中以一种“车祸式”的糟糕状态出现,基本上是在扮演一个精神崩溃的自己。“那是最好的时代,也是最坏的时代,”她说。1977 年 7 月,在该剧收视率接近顶峰时,她离开了《玛丽·哈特曼,玛丽·哈特曼》。
路易丝·拉瑟出生在纽约市,是独生女。父亲索尔·拉瑟 (Sol Lasser) 是一位会计师,通过出版一系列面向门外汉的所得税指南而发财;母亲保拉 (Paula,原姓 Cohen) 是一位室内设计师。用艾伦 (Allen) 的话来说,她在成长过程中是在“第五大道的时髦餐厅里享用蜗牛” (而此时艾伦在吃罐装的 Del Monte 细长豆角)。她就读于收费的菲尔德斯顿学校 (Fieldston school),并在马萨诸塞州沃尔瑟姆的布兰代斯大学 (Brandeis University) 学习政治学。由于患有抑郁症,她很快辍学了。
房屋。他引起争议地不允许指名道姓地列出据称涉及的知名人士,并表示:“姓名相关吗?指控是由某些人提出的,而这些人并不一定是知情者,且指控是二手传达的,而对方此时并不在现场为自己辩护。”贝克被多项指控定罪,并被判处五次终身监禁。
乔维特还主持了 2001 年的一场审判,该案中逃离塔利班的阿富汗人在前一年被判定犯有斯坦斯特劫机罪。他否决了这些被告关于因塔利班威胁而被迫行事的辩护,并认为有“压倒性”的证据证明其有罪,但这些结论在上诉中被推翻——由此引发了关于高级法院司法宽容的指控。
他没有法律背景的人脉,也没有就读过名校或牛剑(Oxbridge)。尽管如此,乔维特凭借实力晋升至该行业的最高级别。在一次对司法独立核心原则的强力证明中,他告诉哈米尔(Hamill)调查小组:“我们在开展工作时,对真相所在没有任何预设。我们渴望尽一切合理努力去发现真相……我们独立于政府或任何其他机构或个人……决定和建议将仅由我们自己做出。我们也不会允许自己被他人引导或受到不当影响,无论对方是谁。”
埃德温·乔维特爵士 (Sir Edwin Jowitt),巡回法院及高等法院法官,出生于 1929. 10 月 1 日。他于 2026 年 6 月 22 日去世,享年 96 岁。
拉塞尔在 1958 年的一次双人约会中首次结识艾伦,当时她还与哈琳·罗森结婚。在艾伦的鼓励下,她开始在格林威治村的咖啡馆表演即兴短剧,从而崭露头角;她参加了桑福德·迈斯纳 (Sanford Meisner) 的表演课,并在商业广告中引起了关注。拉塞尔于 1962 年在音乐剧《我能为你批发》(I Can Get It for You Wholesale) 中担任芭芭拉·史翠珊 (Barbra Streisand) 的替演,完成了她的百老汇首秀,但她的心理健康状况依然脆弱,尤其是在她的母亲于 1964 年自杀之后。
她与艾伦于 1966 年结婚,随着艾伦从脱口秀转向疯狂喜剧电影,她的星途也随之冉冉升起。在《香蕉》(Bananas) 中,她扮演艾伦那个认真的活动家女友,在甩掉艾伦后,激励他加入南美国家的一场革命——但在之前,艾伦与拉塞尔扮演的角色之间有一场性爱戏,并在现场观众面前通过电视播出。
在《玛丽·哈特曼,玛丽·哈特曼》(Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman) 之后,拉塞尔继续断断续续地在《出租车》(Taxi) 和《圣处》(St Elsewhere) 等喜剧系列剧中工作,并在艾伦的《星尘记忆》(Stardust Memories) (1980) 中担任一个未署名角色。
在晚年,拉塞尔经营着位于上东区的路易丝·拉塞尔表演工作室 (Louise Lasser Acting Studio),她的长期伴侣、电影制片人迈克尔·西特里尼蒂 (Michael Citriniti) 在她去世后仍健在。她曾在一些艺术电影中客串出演,例如备受好评的黑色喜剧《幸福》(Happiness) (1998)。艾伦感叹道,“如果她不必一直面对那么艰辛的奋斗,她本可以成为多么巨大的巨星”。
八月星空图
使用此星图时,请将其举起,使您所面向的方向处于星图底部。此时,星图的底边即代表您的实际地平线,中心则代表正上方(天顶)。此视图适用于英国在格林威治标准时间(GMT)8月 1 日午夜、8月 15 日晚上11点以及8月 31 日晚上10点的观测情况。
克里斯·林托特 (Chris Lintott)
八月是对天文观测者而言充满迷人的月份,一系列天体事件将在这个月上演,其中最受关注的是 8 月 12 日 的日食。在不列颠群岛,我们将错过全食的壮丽景象,但在一个夏日的傍晚,我们能观测到一次大幅度的偏食。
具体时间取决于您所在的精确位置,但该事件大约在下午 6.15 分开始,在不到一小时后达到食甚,并在日落前的下午 8 点左右结束。在该地区的绝大部分地区,食甚时太阳盘面的 90% 以上将被覆盖,这是在 2090 年全食再次光临这些海岸之前,我们将看到的幅度最大的一次偏食。
令人惊讶的是,即使是 90% 的日食也很容易被忽略,因为人的眼睛会迅速适应光线水平的变化。观测偏食最简单的方法是使用针孔相机投射太阳的图像。一张卡纸上的针孔即可实现,不过我经常使用漏锅或茶滤来产生多个图像;此外,也可以留意自然版本的投影,新月形的太阳图像经常通过树叶投影在地面上。
也可以使用特制的日食眼镜来遮挡大部分阳光,但如果这些眼镜是之前活动的遗留物,请先通过观察家用灯光来检查;任何有损坏或针孔的眼镜都应丢弃。
如果天气配合,这应该是一个易于观察且受欢迎的事件。而对于追逐全食的人来说,天气可能会成为更大的问题,全食路径狭窄,从冰岛西海岸延伸,穿过大西洋,最后横跨西班牙。
此类事件是自然界最壮丽的奇观之一:月球的黑色圆盘被日冕(太阳的外层大气)的珍珠白光芒所环绕,行星和恒星在色调奇异的天空中出现,让人突然感觉到太阳系的机械运转就在眼前。
这一次,处于全食路径上的人们条件较为困难,路径北部的绝大部分地区可能会有云层遮挡。在西班牙,该事件发生在非常接近日落的时间,增加了观测难度,并提高了关键的几分钟可能被云层遮蔽的风险。
随着月球遮挡太阳,温度会明显下降,这可能会导致日食微气候,在最不希望出现云层的时候形成云朵。
如果天气不配合,我们至少可以安慰自己,下一次相当不错的日食将在明年八月到来,全食路径将横跨西班牙南部和直布罗陀,然后穿过北非,包括卢克索。英国将再次能看到一次大幅度的偏食。
日全食非常罕见,地球表面任何一个特定地点平均每 300-400 年才能经历一次全食。不过,我们每年有两个“食季”,在本月日食事件两周后的 8 月 28 日 早晨,将可以看到一次相当不错的月食。
满月在两周前经过太阳表面后,已经完成了半圈轨道运行,将在凌晨 3.30 分 之后进入地球阴影的主体(本影)区域。在 90 分钟后的食甚时,月球表面的 93% 将被遮暗,仅由通过地球大气层折射的光线照亮。因此,被食表面的颜色和亮度取决于
关于我们星球大气的状态,它会受到气候条件和火山喷发的影响。
除了本月的两次食相,在 8 月 13 日的早晨,我们还将迎来英仙座流星雨峰值的绝佳观测条件,此时月亮已不在干扰范围内。英仙座流星雨是年度流星雨中最可靠且最著名的,预计在英国可见的亮流星每小时可达数十颗。观测非常简单,只需一把舒适的椅子并面向西北或东南方向即可。英仙座流星雨源自斯威夫特-塔特尔彗星的碎片,看起来将从东北方向的辐射点发出。
目前的行星天空处于过渡状态,火星、木星和土星均出现在晨空。其中土星的位置最好,在双鱼座中闪耀,并将在 4 日和 31 日两次与月亮相合。星空(尤其是在月光之夜)为观测夏季银河提供了绝佳机会,银河在深夜时分横跨头顶,穿过极易识别的天鹅座及其最亮星心宿二。
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圣经经文由圣经协会提供
出生 JOSHI 夫妇 Naiya 与 Dilan 于 2026 年 7 月 16 日喜得女,取名 Tara。
宫廷通报
诺福克郡,桑德灵厄姆 2026 年 7 月 25 日 在今天上午于爱丁堡 Canongate 教堂举行的查尔斯·罗伯茨牧师(前 Canongate 教堂部长、已故女王的私人牧师及国王的特聘牧师)的葬礼上,大卫·弗格森教授(苏格兰皇家礼拜堂院长)代表国王出席。 伊恩·托伦斯教授代表爱丁堡公爵出席。 查尔斯·里奇夫人代表皇家公主出席。
法律公告
在高等法院 CR-2026-001308 英格兰及威尔士商业与财产法院 公司法院 (ChD) 涉及 U K INSURANCE LIMITED 且 涉及 AVIVA INSURANCE LIMITED 且 涉及 《2000 年金融服务与市场法》第七部分之事项。公告:特此公告,2026 年 7 月 9 日,U K Insurance Limited (“UKIL”) 和 Aviva Insurance Limited (“AIL”) 根据《2000 年金融服务与市场法》(以下简称“该法”)第 107(1) 条,向位于伦敦的高等法院、英格兰及威尔士商业与财产法院、公司法院 (ChD)(以下简称“高等法院”)提交了一份日期为 2026 年 7 月 9 日的 CPR 第 8 部分申请表,请求下达以下命令:1. 根据该法第 111 条,批准一项保险业务转移方案(以下简称“方案”),规定将 UKIL 绝大部分的保险业务(以下简称“转移业务”)转移至 AIL;以及 2. 根据该法第 112 条和第 112A 条,就该方案做出辅助性规定(以下简称“本申请”)。(i) 由独立专家根据该法第 109 条准备的关于方案条款的报告(以下简称“独立专家报告”)、(ii) 阐明方案条款及独立专家报告摘要的指南,以及 (iii) 方案文件的副本,可通过下方列出的相关电话号码、邮寄地址或电子邮件地址联系 UKIL 或 AIL(视情况而定)免费获取。这些文件以及其他相关文件(包括发送给 UKIL 保单持有人的通知样本),自本公告发布之日起至听证会(定义见下文)之日止,也可在 aviva.co.uk/partvii-transfer 获取。该网站将更新任何
关于拟议转让的关键变更将以滚动方式公布。任何与拟议转让相关的疑问或顾虑,应通过以下电子邮件地址、电话号码或邮寄地址提交给 UKIL 或 AIL(视情况而定): 电子邮件:partviiqueries@ukipartnerships.com 电话: 如在英国境内拨打:免费电话 0800 158 2502 如在英国境外拨打:+44 (0) 141 349 0202 拨打 0800 号码在英国境内免费。如从海外拨打,可能会产生费用。国际电话将按标准本地费率收取;但费用可能因网络提供商而异。 服务时间为周一至周五上午 9 点至晚上 7 点,以及银行假期上午 9 点至下午 5 点。通话可能会被监控和/或记录。 邮寄:UK Insurance Part VII Team PO Box 882 Surrey Street, Norwich NR7 7EX.
该申请定于 2026 年 12 月 15 日(以下简称“听证会”)在伦敦 EC4A 1NL, Fetter Lane, 7 Rolls Buildings 的高等法院法官面前审理。任何认为其将受到该计划执行不利影响的人员(包括 UKIL 或 AIL 的任何保单持有人或员工),均有权亲自或通过合格的法律代表出席听证会并表达其观点。若有人打算这样做,请向 UKIL 或 AIL 在给定地址提交书面通知,理想情况下应在 2026 年 12 月 8 日之前提交,并阐明其认为将受到不利影响的原因。
任何声称将受到该计划不利影响但无意出席听证会的人员,可以通过以下方式对该计划提出陈述: (i) 使用上述电话号码致电 UKIL 或 AIL(视情况而定); (ii) 通过上述地址或电子邮件向 UKIL 或 AIL(视情况而定)提交书面陈述,理想情况下应在 2026 年 12 月 8 日之前提交,并阐明其认为将受到不利影响的原因。
任何认为自己将受到该计划不利影响的人员,可在听证会日期之前提出异议。在听证会日期之前收到的所有陈述将在听证会上提交给高等法院。无论提出异议的人员是否打算出席听证会,UKIL 和 AIL 均将在听证会前将任何提出的异议告知金融行为监管局 (Financial Conduct Authority)、审慎监管局 (Prudential Regulation Authority)、独立专家及高等法院。通过对该计划提交异议,您同意将您的异议以及您随异议提供的任何个人数据与 AIL、金融行为监管局、审慎监管局、独立专家及高等法院共享。
如果该计划获得高等法院批准,将导致转让业务从 UKIL 转至 AIL,无论任何人是否拥有因与该计划相关的任何行为而终止、修改、获取或主张权益或权利,或将权益或权利视为终止或修改的权力。任何此类权力仅在高等法院的命令做出相应规定的范围内才具有执行力。
Slaughter and May One Bunhill Row London EC1Y 8YY 代表 UKIL 和 AIL 的事务律师
ASHDOWN Gavin,2026 年 7 月 20 日逝世,享年 53 岁。Tricia 和 Leon Ashdown 怀着极大的悲痛宣布其长子 Gavin 在加利福尼亚州因心脏骤停去世。他曾是 Maidstone Grammar School 的学生,在布鲁内尔大学和牛津大学大学学院学习,随后在加州实现了在计算机技术领域工作的梦想。他的妻子 Judy Reimann 和兄弟 Gordon Ashdown 幸存。如愿捐款请赠予 Cats Protection 或 Bearsted Woodland Trust。
圣詹姆斯宫 2026 年 7 月 25 日 英联邦体育副赞助人——爱丁堡公爵今日出席了在格拉斯哥举行的第 XXIII 届英联邦运动会。
圣詹姆斯宫 2026年7月25日 皇家公主在副海军上将蒂姆·劳伦斯爵士 (Sir Tim Laurence) 的陪同下,于今日下午出席了在伯克希尔郡雅士谷赛马场 (Ascot Racecourse) 举行的乔治国王日活动。
肯辛顿宫 2026年7月25日 格洛斯特公爵(三唱诗班节主席)与格洛斯特公爵夫人于今晚出席了在格洛斯特大教堂举行的《贝尔沙撒的宴席》(Belshazzar’s Feast) 演出,并由薇薇安·哈格里夫斯夫人 (Mrs Vivienne Hargreaves,格洛斯特郡副副代表) 接待。
27 2026 星期一 | 泰晤士报 天气
E
y
T
今日:东南部晴朗炎热。西部地区多云有细雨。最高 28C (82F),最低 11C (52F)
英国概况
图例:b=晴朗, c=多云, d=细雨, pc=局部多云 du=阴沉, f=晴好, fg=雾, h=冰雹, m=薄雾, r=雨, sh=阵雨, sl=雨夹雪, sn=雪, s=太阳, t=雷暴 =前一日 *=数据不可得
Sh
Sh
温度 C 降雨 mm 日照 小时* 昨日正午 昨日至下午5点共24小时
14 C 3.4 3.2 18 C 0.4 4.0 20 PC 1.2 3.0 12 C 8.8 2.5 19 C 2.8 ** 23 PC 0.4 ** 17 R 3.8 0.2 22 C 1.8 ** 25 PC 0.4 10.9 22 C 1.6 ** 21 C 0.8 8.5 19 C 1.6 4.8 21 PC 1.8 7.2 18 R 11.6 4.6 18 R 3.8 2.0 18 R 3.6 4.5 21 R 0.2 ** 22 R 1.0 11.5 25 PC 1.4 12.7 19 C 1.4 1.4 26 PC 0.0 ** 20 C 0.6 11.4 17 C 6.4 ** 13 ** 2.2 5.3 15 R 4.2 ** 11 C 2.0 0.8 19 C 1.4 5.1 22 C 0.2 6.8 17 R 3.4 ** 25 C 0.0 11.9 23 PC 0.2 10.1 18 C 4.4 4.6 24 C 0.0 13.6 20 C 0.0 ** 19 PC 5.2 ** 19 C 0.0 6.4 13 C 2.2 ** 24 C 0.0 ** 21 PC 0.2 ** 19 C 0.0 ** 19 C 0.2 ** 26 PC 0.0 13.1 20 C 0.0 5.8 15 R 6.2 ** 27 PC 0.0 13.5 16 C 4.2 ** 16 R 1.4 5.8 16 R 3.4 0.2 19 R 0.4 2.7 16 PC 0.2 ** 21 C 0.0 8.5
亚伯丁 亚伯波思 安格尔西 艾维摩尔 巴恩斯塔普尔 贝德福德 贝尔法斯特 伯明翰 本茅斯 布里德灵顿 布里斯托 坎伯恩 卡迪夫 爱丁堡 埃克斯代尔缪尔 格拉斯哥 Hereford 赫斯特蒙索 伊普斯威奇 曼岛 怀特岛 泽西岛 凯斯威克 金罗斯 利兹 勒威克 留查斯 林肯 利物浦 伦敦 莱纳姆 曼彻斯特 马盖特 米尔福德海文 纽卡斯尔 诺丁汉 奥克尼群岛 牛津 普利茅斯 波特兰 西里圣玛丽岛 肖勒姆 什鲁普郡 斯诺多尼亚 绍森德 南尤伊斯特 斯多诺韦 蒂雷岛 怀特黑文 威克 叶奥维尔顿
ney
ney
伯明翰
牛津
世界概况 所有读数均为昨日当地正午
31 PC 20 SH 30 S
38 S 33 PC 25 SH 29 PC
31 S 27 S 30 B 26 B 21 B 27 S 30 S
31 PC 32 ** 7 PC 23 S 25 B 17 R 29 S 34 ** 41 S 18 B 27 S 29 PC 28 S 23 PC 30 S 18 PC 27 SH
25 PC 31 PC 17 S 31 PC
28 PC 28 PC 22 DU 28 S 24 B 41 S
阿里坎特 阿姆斯特丹 雅典 奥克兰 巴林 曼谷 巴巴多斯 巴塞罗那 北京 贝鲁特 贝尔格莱德 柏林 百慕大 波尔多 布鲁塞尔 布加勒斯特 布达佩斯 布宜诺斯艾利斯 开罗 加尔各答 堪培拉 开普敦 芝加哥 哥本哈根 科孚岛 德里 迪拜 都柏林 法鲁 佛罗伦萨 法兰克福 日内瓦 直布罗陀 赫尔辛基 香港 檀香山 伊斯坦布尔 耶路撒冷 约翰内斯堡 吉隆坡 基辅 兰萨罗特岛 拉斯帕尔马斯 利马 里斯本 洛杉矶 卢克索
马德拉 马德里 马拉加 马略卡岛 马耳他 墨尔本 墨西哥城 迈阿密 米兰 蒙巴萨 蒙特利尔 莫斯科 孟买 慕尼黑 内罗比 那不勒斯 新奥尔良 纽约 尼斯 尼科西亚 奥斯陆 巴黎 珀斯 布拉格 雷克雅未克 里加 里约热内卢 利雅得 罗马 旧金山 圣地亚哥 圣保罗 首尔 塞舌尔 新加坡 圣彼得堡 斯德哥尔摩 悉尼 特拉维夫 特内里费 东京 温哥华 威尼斯 维也纳 华沙 华盛顿 苏黎世
未来五日预报
风速
南部地区基本干燥炎热。北部地区风力较强,时有雨或阵雨。
明日
南部地区炎热干燥,大部分时间晴朗。北部和西部地区多云且风力较强,伴有阵雨或降雨,但期间有晴朗时段。 最高 29C, 最低 10C
周三
英国东南部非常炎热,主要为晴天。西北部较凉爽,伴有阵雨或阵雨时段,但期间有阳光。 最高 33C, 最低 C
周四
北部和西部地区有阳光时段及零星阵雨。其他地区可能出现少量孤立阵雨,但总体干燥且再次感到炎热。 最高 30C, 最低 6C
总体情况:南部大部分地区干燥、晴朗且炎热。北部和西部多云,伴有轻雨和毛毛雨。 东英格兰、伦敦、中地、英格兰中南部、英格里东南、海峡群岛、英格兰西南、英格兰东部:早晨短暂阵雨过后,将是一个干燥、炎热且晴朗的一天。西风轻至中等。最高 28C (82F),最低 12C (54F)。 英格兰中北部、英格兰西北、湖区、曼岛、威尔士:北威尔士和英格兰西北部有零星阵雨,其余地区晴朗时段与多云交替。
25 PC 26 S 28 S 30 PC 31 PC 14 DU 26 B 33 ** 27 PC 28 B 27 PC 18 C 30 M 23 S 20 B 30 PC 32 PC 26 PC 30 PC 32 PC 18 S 22 B 18 PC 30 S 16 S 22 S 23 PC 41 S 32 PC 21 PC 14 C 18 B 31 PC 29 PC 28 PC 24 B 17 PC 17 PC 31 PC 29 PC 32 PC 18 DU
29 S 28 S 24 B
周五
爱尔兰和英国北部地区大风,伴有零星阵雨。 南部干燥,阳光充沛。体感温度低于近几日,但东南部依然温暖。 最高 27C,最低 6C
潮汐 潮汐预测。 高度单位为米。所有时间均为当地时间
今日 Ht Ht 亚伯丁 埃文茅斯 贝尔法斯特 卡迪夫 德文波特 多佛 都柏林 法尔茅斯 格林诺克 哈里奇 霍利黑德 赫尔 利斯 利物浦 伦敦桥 洛威斯托夫特 米尔福德港 莫康博 纽黑文 纽基 奥班 彭赞斯 朴次茅斯 肖勒姆 南安普敦 斯旺西 蒂斯 韦茅斯
周六
不列颠群岛南部地区干燥且晴朗。西北部大风,伴有零星阵雨,局部时间有大雨。 最高 26C,最低 8C
《泰晤士报》天气页面
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匈牙利,布达佩斯
海况
格拉斯哥 爱丁堡
普利茅斯 埃克塞特 南安普顿
随后更阴沉
天气更阴沉,随后有雨或 山区有细雨。轻至中度 西风。最高 22C (72F), 最低 15C (59F)。 亚伯丁、爱丁堡和邓迪、 边境地区,英格兰东北部:部分地区 云量较多,随后西部可能有 几场阵雨或小雨,其余地区 晴朗,有阳光。轻至中度 西风。最高 19C (66F), 最低 12C (54F)。 北爱尔兰,爱尔兰共和国:中部和 北部地区阴天,伴有
13:23 3.6 06:22 10.7 18:49 11.3 10:53 3.0 23:12 3.3 06:14 10.1 18:43 10.7 05:00 4.5 17:20 4.8 10:50 5.8 23:15 5.8 11:25 3.5 23:29 3.7 04:42 4.3 17:01 4.6 --:-- -- 12:01 2.8 11:17 3.5 23:44 3.6 10:14 4.7 22:23 5.0 05:32 6.4 18:15 6.1 02:00 4.7 14:36 4.7 10:52 7.9 23:05 8.4 01:00 6.2 13:28 6.2 09:08 2.3 21:56 2.2 05:46 5.7 18:07 6.1 11:03 7.8 23:16 8.3 10:47 5.7 23:01 5.8 04:39 5.5 17:00 5.9 05:28 3.1 17:47 3.4 04:13 4.5 16:33 4.8 11:16 4.1 23:23 4.2 10:56 5.2 23:08 5.4 10:07 3.8 22:19 4.0 05:43 7.6 18:09 8.1 03:04 4.8 15:37 4.8 06:04 1.4 18:26 1.8
天气概况 一暖锋正向东漂移, 经过不列颠群岛北部和西部, 带来云层及局部轻雨, 主要影响西部山区。高压脊 为英国南部带来普遍晴朗的天气, 气温将再次升高。高压脊 将在明天进一步加强,而锋面 将继续影响北部。
及其风景优美的周边环境和辉煌的“蓝色”多瑙河。
之都布拉格开始,这次极受欢迎的 假期将带您穿梭于波希米亚的核心地带。 参观宏伟的维也纳,
奥克尼群岛 设得兰群岛
ney ney
卡莱尔 纽卡斯尔
21 16
曼彻斯特 利物浦 赫尔
谢菲尔德
什鲁布里 诺丁汉
阵雨。南部天气较为干燥, 阳光最为灿烂。 轻至中度西南风。最高 23C (73F),最低 15C (59F)。 苏格兰西南部,格拉斯哥,中部高地, 北群岛,苏格兰西北部,苏格兰东北部, 阿盖尔,莫雷峡湾:西部地区多云有雨, 山区有薄雾或浓雾。 该地区东部较为干燥,有阳光间隔。 轻至中度西风。最高 17C (63F),最低 11C (52F)。
黑夜时段 亚伯丁 贝尔法斯特 伯明翰 卡迪夫 埃克塞特 格拉斯哥 利物浦 伦敦 曼彻斯特 纽卡斯尔 诺里奇 彭赞斯 谢菲尔德
22:02-04:29 22:04-04:58 21:38-04:51 21:39-05:01 21:37-05:05 22:04-04:44 21:46-04:51 21:26-04:48 21:43-04:48 21:48-04:38 21:26-04:38 21:42-05:15 21:40-04:45
最高温:弗里滕登,27.4C 最低温:凯恩戈姆,4.2C 最湿润:北安伯兰,奇林汉姆谷仓, 26.6mm 最晴朗:肯特,东马林, 14.0小时*
日出日落与月相 格林威治时间 日出: 日落: 月出: 月落:
05.16 20.56 20.19 03.28 周二
满月:7月29日
以及顶级的咖啡和蛋糕。参观 充满国际都市氛围的斯洛伐克首都布拉迪斯拉发, 以及坐落在波澜壮阔的多瑙河畔的 雄伟“双子城”布达佩斯。 在可选的行程中,您将有机会 探索重建的巴洛克风格城市德累斯顿, 为您的精彩之旅画上圆满句号。
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S1 45
IPL 所有人将为老特拉福德球场升级提供资金
Elizabeth Ammon
格拉斯哥 仅限奖牌赛项
Ward (苏格兰) 79.65分; 2, F Dolci (加拿大) 79.45; 3, J Moore (澳大利亚) 79.00; 5, A Tobin (英国) 78.800。
52.90; 3, L-M Fontaine (加拿大) 52.80; 4, S-E Amankwaah (英国) 51.55。
女子
男子: 自由泳: 50m 1, C McEvoy (澳大利亚) 20.97秒 (运动会纪录); 2, F Southam (澳大利亚) 21.44; 3, J Jack (澳大利亚) 21.47; 7, J Mills (英国) 22.19。 4 x 200m 接力 1, 澳大利亚 7分 1.47秒 (运动会纪录); 2, 英国 (G Shepherd, T Dean, J Guy, M Litchfield) 7:04.98; 3, 威尔士 (M Richards, D Jones, K Bird, T Melbourne-Smith) 7:09.59。 仰泳:
2, O Morgan (英国) 1:56.44; 3, L Greenbank (英国) 1:56.58。 蝶泳: 100m 1, J Liendo (加拿大) 50.42 (运动会纪录); 2, M Temple (澳大利亚) 50.43; 3, B Armbruster (澳大利亚) 50.58; 6, E Mildred (英国) 51.59。 女子: 自由泳:
Fairweather (新西兰) 15:58.97; 3, M Walker (澳大利亚) 16:01.37; 7, A Blocksidge (英国) 16:27.55。
2, K Masse (加拿大) 58.77; 3, O Nel (南非) 1:00.09; 5, L Cox (英国) 1:00.35。 蛙泳: 100m 1, A Evans (苏格兰) 1:06.07; 2, A Canny (南非) 1:06.19; 3, S Toohey (澳大利亚) 1:06.47。
(马来西亚) 299分 (运动会纪录); 2, R Muthupandi (印度) 286; 3, M Baru (巴布亚 新几内亚) 282。 60kg 1, B Mohamad Aniq (马来西亚) 273 (运动会 纪录); 2, R Chanambam (印度) 264; 3, J Mboya (肯尼亚) 260; 7, K Stiles (英国) 221。 女子: 48kg 1, M Saikhom (印度) 190 (运动会纪录); 2, R Nyong (尼日利亚) 168; 3, I Henry (马来西亚) 167; 5, T Wong (英国) 160。
24.
“这是为了未来的建设,”Goenka 说道。“我们将为球迷提供观看训练课的选择。这将面向全球所有超级巨星特许经营特许经营权开放,因此他们可以来到这里进行训练营,我们可以培养球员,并对其及未来进行投资。”
兰开夏郡的 IPL 合作伙伴在老特拉福德(Old Trafford)的基础设施上投入如此巨额资金,清楚地表明 RPSG 计划长期发展。
RPSG 以及“百球赛”(the Hundred)的其他私人所有者意识到,他们可能在若干年内无法获得投资回报。该赛事的未来盈利能力将取决于其规模的增长和发展。
The Hundred: 曼彻斯特超级巨星 (Manchester Super Giants) 对阵 伯明翰凤凰 (Birmingham Phoenix):男子组
老特拉福德 (Old Trafford) (伯明翰凤凰赢得掷硬币): 曼彻斯特超级巨星 (4pts) 以 87 跑之差击败伯明翰凤凰
曼彻斯特超级巨星 (球数)
*A Markram 被接球并被 Ahmed 击球出局 6 (9)
T Seifert 被 Clarke 接球 b Dwarshuis 1 (2) @J Buttler 被 Dwarshuis 接球 b Mahmood 90 (50)
H Klaasen 被 Ferreira 接球 b Ahmed 20 (11)
L du Plooy 跑出局 13 (8)
T Moores 未出局 39 (17)
L Dawson 未出局 6 (3)
额外分 (b 1, lb 5, w 6) 12
总计 (5 wkts, 100 balls) 187
G Atkinson, N Ahmad, J Tongue 和 S Baker
未击球。
未击球。
出局顺序 1, 3, 2, 45, 3, 90, 4, 113, 5, 181.
投球 Mahmood 20-5-33-1; Dwarshuis
20-7-33-1; Currie 15-5-28-0; Tariq 15-3-29-0;
Ahmed 20-5-43-2; Ferreira 10-1-15-0.
伯明翰凤凰 (球数) @J Clarke 被 Buttler 接球 b Dawson 20 (17)
W Smeed b Tongue 8 (8)
R Ahmed b Tongue 0 (1)
Le Evans 被 Seifert 接球 b Atkinson 13 (13)
*D Ferreira 被 du Plooy 接球 b Ahmad 23 (25)
M Owen 被 Atkinson 接球 b Baker 13 (7)
S Dickson 被 Atkinson 接球 b Dawson 2 (6)
B Dwarshuis b Ahmad 0 (1)
S Currie 未出局 14 (11)
S Mahmood b Baker 0 (1)
U Tariq 被 Baker 接球 b Dawson 2 (7)
额外分 (b 1, lb 2, w 2) 5
总计 (97 balls) 100
出局顺序 1-20, 2, 20, 3, 43, 4, 43, 5, 73,
6-81, 7, 82, 8, 85, 9, 96.
投球 Atkinson 20 (balls)-11 (dot balls)-20
(runs)-1 (wickets); Baker 20-10-25-2; Tongue
时间,他们希望这将通过广播权的价值提升,以及满场观众、商品销售和赞助收入来获得回报。 “The Hundred 在过去几年里表现得非常出色,”Goenka 说道。
伦敦精神队 (London Spirit) (球数)
伦敦精神队 (London Spirit) (球数)
L-d Pretorius 被 Billings 接球 b Overton 24 (14) @J Bairstow 被 Overton 接球并击球 0 (2)
J Rew 被 Duckett 接球 b Harrison 26 (15)
*L Livingstone 被 Henry 接球 b Harrison 33 (24)
D Brevis 被 Santner 接球 b Amir 39 (24)
J Coles 被 Santner 接球并击球 2 (3)
J Overton 被 Harrison 接球 b Henry 9 (5)
D Willey 跑出界 11 (7)
A Tye b Gregory 7 (5)
A Milne 未出局 1 (1)
额外分 (lb 2, w 5) 7
总分 (9 wicket, 100 球) 159
A Zampa 未击球。
出局顺序 1-9, 2-40, 3-64, 4-117, 5-127,
6-130, 7-143, 8-157, 9-159.
投球 Amir 20-9-25-1; Overton 20-8-40-2;
Henry 10-2-29-1; Harrison 20-3-25-2; Santner
15-5-21-1; Gregory 15-8-17-1,
特伦特火箭队 (Trent Rockets) (球数)
特伦特火箭队 (Trent Rockets) (球数)
B Duckett 被 Coles 接球 b Tye 75 (47)
F Allen 被 Bairstow 接球 b Willey 0 (5)
T Banton 被 Rew 接球 b Tye 22 (14)
T David 被 Milne 接球 b Overton 9 (10)
*@S Billings 被 Brevis 接球 b Milne 22 (10)
M Santner 未出局 7 (4)
L Gregory 被 Coles 接球 b Milne 1 (3)
C Overton 未出局 20 (6)
额外分 (lb 3, nb 1) 4
总分 (6 wkts 98 球) 160
C Harrison, M Henry 和 M Amir 未击球。
出局顺序 1-15, 2-87, 3-108, 4-109, 5-133,
6-135.
投球 Willey 20-14-24-1; Milne 20-9-25-2;
Tye 20-4-35-2; Overton 18-5-30-1; Zampa
15-3-32-0; Livingstone 5-0-11-0.
特伦特桥 (Trent Bridge) (伦敦精神队赢得 {toss}):
伦敦精神队 (4pts) 以 5 个 wicket 击败特伦特火箭队
K Garth 未出局 4 (4)
额外分 (b 1, lb 2, w 4, nb 1) 8
总分 (7 wkts, 100 球) 142
S Bates 和 K Levick 未击球。
出局顺序 1-1, 2-34, 3-65, 4-71, 5-95,
6-130, 7-130.
投球 Kapp 20-14-12-3; Dottin 10-2-32-0;
Dean 20-10-18-2; Pavely 20-2-32-1; de Klerk
20-5-30-0; Groves 5-1-7-0; Harris 5-1-8-0.
G Harris 被 Luff 接球 b Gardner 37 (20)
†A Jones 被 Jones 接球 b Elwiss 21 (19)
M Kelly 被 Mooney 接球 b Bates 39 (26)
M Kapp 被 Bates 接球 b Levick 2 (5)
S Kalis b Gardner 0 (2)
N de Klerk 未出局 41 (22)
C Pavely 未出局 2 (4)
额外分 (lb 1, w 2, nb 1) 4
总分 (5 wkts, 97 球) 146
D Dottin, *C Dean, K George 和 J Groves 未击球
出局顺序 1-55, 2-61, 3-63, 4-67, 5-130.
投球 Bates 20-9-30-1; Garth 20-6-27-0;
Elwiss 15-4-25-1; Levick 10-4-22-1; Gardner
20-7-24-2; Adams 12-2-17-0.
男子组 P W L T NR Pts NRR 曼彻斯特 SG (Manchester SG) 2 2 0 0 0 8 2.35 威尔士之火 (Welsh Fire) 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.53 MI 伦敦 (MI London) 2 1 1 0 0 4 0.29 特伦特火箭队 (Trent Rockets) 2 1 1 0 0 4 -0.13 利兹日出队 (Leeds Sunrisers) 2 1 1 0 0 4 -0.61 伯明翰凤凰队 (B’ham Phoenix) 2 1 1 0 0 4 -1.92 伦敦精神队 (London Spirit) 2 0 2 0 0 0 -0.27 南方勇士队 (Southern Brave) 2 0 2 0 0 0 -0.28
女子组 P W L T NR Pts NRR 南方勇士队 (Southern Brave) 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.35 曼彻斯特 SG (Manchester SG) 2 1 0 0 1 6 3.29 特伦特火箭队 (Trent Rockets) 2 1 1 0 0 4 2.68 威尔士之火 (Welsh Fire) 2 1 1 0 0 4 1.30 利兹日出队 (Leeds Sunrisers) 2 1 1 0 0 4 0.94 伦敦精神队 (London Spirit) 2 1 1 0 0 4 -1.43 伯明翰凤凰队 (B’ham Phoenix) 2 0 1 0 1 2 -7.77 MI 伦敦 (MI London) 2 0 2 0 0 0 -2.86
P W L T NR Pts NRR
P W L T NR Pts NRR
Goenka 是在结合经验说话。他是一位成功的商人,净资产约为 $5 billion (£3.75 billion),并成立了勒克瑙超级 [[SOURCE_CLEANUP_NOTE: Text cuts off]]
汤顿 萨默塞特 337-8 (L Goldsworthy 103, T Lammonby 85, J Thomas 50);
沃里克郡 212 (J Lintott 52; J Theedom 4 for 54)。萨默塞特 (4pts) 以 125 跑之差获胜。
吉尔福德 北安普顿郡 254-8 (N McSweeney 64, G Bartlett 62; B Floros 4 for 60); 萨里 258-4 (A Thomas 83 未出局, R Patel 64)。萨里 (4pts) 以 6 个球门之差获胜。
| 球队 | 赛 | 胜 | 平 | 负 | 0 | 0 | 点数 | 净胜率 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 萨默塞特 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.87 | |
| 诺丁汉郡 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.42 | |
| 萨里 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.27 | |
| 莱斯特郡 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.11 | |
| 格洛斯特郡 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 0.22 | |
| 兰开夏郡 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 0.00 | |
| 北安普顿郡 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 4 | -0.31 | |
| 肯特郡 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 | -0.68 | |
| 沃里克郡 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -0.97 |
B组:切姆斯福德 埃塞克斯 257-7 (T Westley 102); 德比郡 248-9 (H Came 97)。埃塞克斯 (4pts) 以 9 跑之差获胜。拉德莱特 格拉摩根 66 (N Sharma 4 for 29); 米德尔塞克斯 67-2。米德尔塞克斯 (4pts) 以 8 个球门之差获胜。霍夫 约克郡 325-7 (W Luxton 117, S Whiteman 74); 萨塞克斯 140 (F Hudson-Prentice 50; B Coad 5 for 12)。约克郡 (4pts) 以 184 跑之差获胜 (D/L 方法)。 伍斯特 伍斯特郡
307-8 (H Cullen 72, K Ali 65, D Lategan 64); 汉普郡 303 (T Prest 70, N Gubbins 57)。伍斯特郡 (4pts) 以 4 跑之差获胜。
| 球队 | 赛 | 胜 | 平 | 负 | 0 | 0 | 点数 | 净胜率 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 米德尔塞克斯 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 12 | 2.95 | |
| 约克郡 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.98 | |
| 达勒姆 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.78 | |
| 伍斯特郡 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 0.74 | |
| 埃塞克斯 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 | -0.32 | |
| 汉普郡 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 4 | -0.76 | |
| 格拉摩根 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 4 | -1.36 | |
| 德比郡 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -0.53 | |
| 萨塞克斯 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | -2 | -1.81 |
LIV 高尔夫 UK
罗切斯特: 最终领先成绩(除非另有说明,均为英国和爱尔兰选手): 258 L Herbert (Aus) 61, 66, 69, 62. 264 T Hatton 66 68, 67, 63. 267 B DeChambeau (US) 64, 67, 68, 68. 271 C Smith (Aus) 69, 67, 66, 69. 274 C Surratt (US) 68, 69, 70 , 67; A Ancer (Mex) 68, 70, 65, 71. 275 L Canter 73, 66, 70, 66; C Howell III (US) 68, 70, 69, 68; H Varner III (US) 66, 69, 68, 72.
美国 PGA 巡回赛 3M 公开赛
明尼苏达州布莱恩: 三轮后领先者(除非另有说明,均为美国选手):193 J Koivun 64, 68, 61. 196 B Kohles 62, 69, 65; E Grillo (Arg) 64, 67, 65. 197 M Brennan 65, 69, 63. 198 D McCarthy 66, 68, 64; B Horschel 67, 66, 65; M Kim 69, 59, 70.
女子苏格兰公开赛
欧文:最终领先成绩:279 J Shin (S Kor) 66, 67, 71, 75. 281 A-Lim Kim (S Kor) 67 72, 74, 68. 283 P Anannarukarn (Thai) 71, 69 69, 74. 284 E Henseleit (Ger) 70 68, 73, 73. 285 L Coughlin (US) 66, 74, 74, 71; M Yamashita (Japan) 70, 74, 70, 71.
Betfred 超级联赛 利 28 沃灵顿 12; 利兹 42 布拉德福德 12; 图卢兹 16 卡塔隆巨龙 18; 约克 22 哈德斯菲尔德
ATP Generali 公开赛
基茨比ュ赫尔:决赛 Q Halys (Fr) 击败 A Bublik (Kaz) 6-4, 7-6 (8-6)。
ATP Millennium 公开赛
埃什托里尔:决赛 L Van Assche (Fr) 击败 A Blockx
2026年7月27日 星期一 | 泰晤士报 体育 赛马
Cathy Harris
她为索尔海姆杯 (Solheim Cup) 选定的欧洲队阵容,边缘球员将在本周于皇家利瑟姆和圣安妮斯 (Royal Lytham & St Annes) 举行的 AIG 女子公开赛中获得最后一次争取机会。 队长昨天在 ISPS Handa 苏格兰公开赛上密切关注情况。在这次比赛中,德国选手埃斯特·亨瑟莱特 (Esther Henseleit) 以第四名完赛,成为欧洲选手中排名最高者;冠军由韩国选手珍妮·申 (Jenny Shin) 获得,她以两杆之差击败同胞金阿林 (Kim A-lim),结束了十年的冠军荒。 女子欧洲巡回赛 (LET) 索尔海姆杯
罗布·赖特 (Rob Wright)
罗布·赖特 (Rob Wright)
罗布·赖特 (Rob Wright)
罗布·赖特 (Rob Wright)
5.15 让磅赛 (£4,397: 5f) (12)
5.50 锦标赛 (£5,400: 1m 2f) (5)
6.20 锦标赛 (2岁马: £5,400: 6f) (7)
6.53 让磅赛 (3岁马: £4,397: 6f) (6)
7.28 让磅赛 (£10,800: 6f) (14)
8.00 让磅赛 (£4,397: 1m) (9)
诺德奎斯特拥有四个挑选名额,而美国队队长安格拉·斯坦福 (Angela Stanford) 仅限三个。 这一两年一度的赛事将于 9 月 11 日至 13 日在荷兰的 Bernardus 高尔夫俱乐部举行。 诺德奎斯特曾三次赢得大满贯冠军,并九次参加索尔海姆杯。她目前仍是一名活跃球员,并希望在仍与球员和球童保持密切联系时担任此职。这位 39 岁的瑞典人表示:“我知道发生了什么,而且我认为球员们并不意识到我的参与程度之深。外界有很多猜测,但事实上,我甚至还不确定要挑选谁。”
8.30 让磅赛
(3岁马: £3,768: 1m 2f) (8)
2.15 锦标赛 (2岁马: £7,020: 7f) (5)
2.45 让磅赛 (£4,187: 6f) (9)
3.15 让磅赛 (£5,234: 7f) (6)
3.45 让磅赛 (£3,664: 1m) (9)
4.15 让磅赛 (£5,154: 1m 2f) (7)
4.45 让磅赛 (£3,664: 5f) (9)
在克服个人创伤后,诺德奎斯特承担起队长的责任,展现了非凡的韧性。她承认,这份承诺比她预想的要更令她心力交瘁。2024 年的一场痛苦离婚给她带来了沉重的打击,而随后前任丈夫的突然去世更是雪上加霜。“我曾经历过地狱般的痛苦,但我重建了生活,现在处于一个好得多的状态,”诺德奎斯特说。 “与球员打交道是一回事,但后台还有很多其他事情在进行。 “这在精神上非常耗神且令人疲惫,但我绝对热爱”
5.20 让磅赛 (£3,664: 1m 2f) (13)
2.30 让磅赛 (£3,978: 1m 6f) (10)
3.00 锦标赛 (£6,480: 1m 4f) (14)
3.30 让磅赛 (3岁马: £3,978: 1m 3f) (14)
4.00 让磅赛 (3岁马: £3,245: 1m) (14)
诺德奎斯特的目标是重新赢回她在作为欧洲队球员时曾四次赢得的奖杯
4.30 锦标赛 (2岁马: £15,462: 7f) (12)
5.00 让磅赛 (第一组: £5,234: 7f) (12)
5.30 让磅赛 (第二组: £5,234: 7f) (11)
6.05 让磅赛 (£5,234: 6f) (14)
场地情况:良好至坚硬 (部分区域良好)
场地情况:良好
2.30 (1m 6yd) 1, Asset (L Morris, 2-
13 热门); 2, Albemagic (4-1); 3, Feliz
Navidad (28-1). 1 l, 12l. M Prescott.
3.00 (5f 3yd) 1, Bolt Of Blue (B
Loughnane, 7-2); 2, The Mean
Fiddler (7-1); 3, Onslaught (13-2). 6
匹参赛. 未参赛: Sole Ruler. ns, 3 l. E
Dunlop.
3.30 (1m 6yd) 1, Polygram (R Scott,
7-2 热门); 2, Mount King (7-2 热门); 3,
Bradbury (6-1). 7 匹参赛. 1 l, nk. T
Davidson.
4.00 (1m 6yd) 1, Holloway Boy (C
在 Evian 冠军赛之后,Nordqvist 在 Bernardus 举行了一次团队练习赛,所有竞争选拔名额的选手都参加了。她将该球场描述为与 Walton Heath 相似,拥有水障碍,并表示在抬高的果岭上让球停下的能力是一个巨大的优势。 欧洲队旨在夺回奖杯,Nordqvist 有很多选择来完成她的阵容。竞争者包括通过 LET 排名入选的德国选手 Helen Briem,以及根据世界排名入选的 Nanna Koerstz Madsen, Leona Maguire, Julia López Ramírez, Mimi Rhodes 和 Ingrid Lindblad。
6.00 让分赛 (3-Y-O: £3,664: 1m 2f) (7)
6.30 彩金赛 (2-Y-O: £5,757: 6f) (7)
7.05 彩金赛 (£5,234: 1m) (5)
7.40 幼马赛 (2-Y-O: £4,711: 6f) (6)
8.10 让分赛 (3-Y-O: £7,731: 1m) (6)
8.40 让分赛 (£3,664: 5f) (6)
5.00 (6f) 1, Go Victor (B Garritty, 28-1); 2, Starsong (100-30); 3, Battenburg Belle (17-2). 11 ran. 1 l, 1 l. T Culhane & S Barclay.
5.30 (6f) 1, The Good Biscuit (J Hart, 1-1); 2, Bell Shot (11-4); 3, Iris Dancer (8-1). 4 ran. NR: Trilby. 1 l, 27 l. Mrs R Carr.
Placepot: £33.00 Quadpot: £11.30
Jackpot: £4,828.90
2.12 (1m 7f 168yd hdle) 1, Hello Garda (P Hanlon, 40-1); 2, Vietnorm (8-11 fav); 3, Salkadan (5-2). 9 ran. 17 l, 1 l. D Elsworth & R Hatch.
3.42 (3m 10yd ch) 1, Hold Your Fort (T Bellamy, 16-1); 2, Grand Clermont (7-2); 3, The Flying Poet (9-2). 7 ran. NR: Stans The Man. 1 l, 5 l. Mrs D Hamer.
4.12 (2m 7f 70yd hdle) 1, Idaho Fire (J J Burke, 7-2); 2, Divilabother (15-8 fav); 3, Tyson (13-2). 9 ran. 17 l, 37 l. J Owen.
4.42 (2m 4f ch) 1, At The Oche (H Skelton, 11-10 fav); 2, Ras Kassar (13-2); 3, Country Park (100-30). 10 ran. 1 l, 8 l. D Skelton.
5.12 (2m 3f 207yd hdle) 1,
伊劳拉带来诸多思考
伊恩·惠特尔 (Ian Whittell) 纳什维尔报道
安多尼·伊劳拉 (Andoni Iraola) 作为利物浦主教练的首秀,在周六晚上于纳什维尔的一场热身赛中以 4-2 击败桑德兰而告终。以下是这场美国季前赛的五个讨论点。
戈麦斯加剧防线危机 比赛还不到 8 分钟,伊劳拉就面临了第一个重大头疼问题。被任命为本场比赛队长的 29, 岁球员乔·戈麦斯 (Joe Gomez) 因未指明的腿部问题被提前换下,这加剧了伊劳拉在防线上已经面临的问题。具体的伤情和预后尚未公布,但伊劳拉赛后表示:“最糟糕的消息大概就是乔立即受伤了。‘我们之前很高兴,因为训练期间没有球员受伤,但不幸的是,我们立刻失去了乔。’” 从雷恩 (Rennes) 以 £60 million 身价签下的中后卫杰里米·雅克 (Jérémy Jacquet) 在 2 月份的一场比赛中肩关节脱位,当时他刚刚同意在夏天转会至安菲尔德并参加首场比赛。这位 21, 岁球员随利物浦访问美国,但伤病使他缺席了揭幕战,且他很可能也会缺席周三在纽约对阵雷克斯汉姆 (Wrexham) 的比赛。“对于杰里米来说,他已经有很多个月没有比赛了。他训练得很好,但我们会对他采取谨慎态度,”伊劳拉说。“他可能会在这次美国之行的最后一场比赛(在芝加哥对阵利兹联)中登场。” 中后卫位置依然是个问题,戈麦斯长期以来饱受伤病困扰,严重限制了他的职业生涯。35, 岁的范戴克 (Virgil van Dijk) 正在利物浦家中开始他的季前训练,此前他在世界杯和俱乐部赛季中出场时间超过了欧洲任何一名场上球员。他将在接下来的赛季末到期解约,戈麦斯同样如此。去年夏天从帕尔马 (Parma) 以 £26 million 身价签下的乔瓦尼·莱奥尼 (Giovanni Leoni) 上赛季仅出战一场便遭遇 ACL 撕裂,目前距离复出仍有距离。这意味着伊劳拉在对阵桑德兰的大部分时间里,不得不让 18 岁球员莫塔拉·恩迪亚耶 (Mor Talla Ndiaye) 和伊费阿尼·恩杜克韦 (Ifeanyi Ndukwe) 镇守中后卫位置。
埃利奥特的复苏机会 这个夏天一直被认为是哈维·埃利奥特 (Harvey Elliott) 职业生涯至关重要的一段时间——尽管在上赛季开始时,这是因为他看起来很有希望在托马斯·图赫尔 (Thomas Tuchel) 的世界杯大名单中争取一个位置,甚至是一个关键角色。这位边锋此前在英格兰 21 岁以下球队的征程中表现活跃,并被评为欧青赛的最佳球员。即便阿尔内·斯洛特 (Arne Slot) 允许他租借加盟阿斯顿维拉 (Aston Villa) —— 协议规定如果他出场十场联赛,维拉将以 £35 million 的价格强制买断 —— 这似乎也是向图赫尔展示能力的理想之举。 然而,他发现自己并不受维拉欢迎。而且,由于他在 8 月份替补出场的一场对阵纽卡斯尔联 (Newcastle United) 的比赛中为利物浦出场了一分钟联赛,他无法在 2025-26 赛季再次通过租借加入第三家俱乐部。这个夏天是这位 23 岁球员向利物浦新主教练证明自己能力的机会。尽管在上半场对阵桑德兰的比赛中出场并贡献了一次助攻,尚不足以定论,但他看起来状态良好、活力充沛,且渴望给人留下深刻印象。
我们能赢得冠军
彼得·鲁茨勒 悉尼
切尔西边锋杰米·吉滕斯希望,以 £117 million 身价加盟的摩根·罗杰斯能帮助这家西伦敦俱乐部提升水平,并在本赛季赢得“一切”。 罗杰斯上周完成了从阿斯顿维拉的转会,打破了英国转会费纪录,签署了一份为期七年的合同。 法国中后卫马克斯·拉克鲁将与他一同加盟,后者已同意以 £52 million 的价格从水晶宫转会。 曾在英格兰 Under-21 队与罗杰斯共同出战的吉滕斯,可能会在位置竞争上面临更多压力。 与吉滕斯一样,罗杰斯也可以在左边路出击。但这位 21 岁的球员自信罗杰斯能帮助切尔西告别那个排名英超第十的糟糕赛季。 “关于他的加盟,大家都很兴奋,”吉滕斯说。“我们想要赢得一切。这就是我们的雄心,赢得英超联赛、足总杯,以及赢得任何我们参加的赛事。引进像摩根这样的球员,有望提升我们赢得冠军的门槛。” 切尔西目前身在澳大利亚悉尼,这是其季前巡演的一部分,行程还将包括香港、马来西亚和印度尼西亚。本周,他们将于明天面对西悉尼实用者,然后在周六对阵托特纳姆热刺。
索博斯莱出任副队长? 多米尼克·索博斯莱在半场休息时从科斯塔斯·齐米卡斯手中接过队长袖标,此前在戈麦斯被换下时,袖标由齐米卡斯持有。本周有人询问伊劳拉,这位 25 岁的球员在本赛季是否可能被任命为副队长,尤其是在他在安菲尔德签署了续约合同之后。 新任主教练回避了这一话题,指出由于世界杯的原因,他甚至还没有与阵容中的许多球员进行交谈。不过,伊劳拉并不掩饰他对索博斯莱新签五年合同的欣喜之情,并将其视为俱乐部向前发展的基石。在纳什维尔的比赛中,他在比分 1-1 时于半场被换入,确实为利物浦的进攻增加了一个维度。
冉冉升起的之星……以及一名老将 可以肯定地说,里奥·恩古莫哈至少已经确立了自己在球队中的位置,这位 17 岁的边锋上赛季出战了 19 场英超联赛。他展现了更多直接的打法和细腻的脚法,而这正是利物浦常驻球员们所熟悉的风格。但右边锋基兰·莫里森,19 岁,在纳什维尔的演出令人印象深刻,他打入了首球并构成了持续的威胁。到目前为止,他唯一的一线队出场机会都在杯赛中,但未来可能会有更多机会。 在年龄谱系的另一端,28 岁的意大利人费德里科·基耶萨在安菲尔德的两个完整赛季中仅在两场英超比赛中首发,但他攻入了进球并助攻了刘易斯·库马斯的第四球,提醒人们他的深厚底蕴。
还需要更多新援 雅克和来自奥萨苏纳的西班牙前锋维克多·穆诺斯是迄今为止唯一的重要新援——尽管花费了近 £100 million ——但伊劳拉毫不掩饰他想要更多球员的事实。 当被追问该话题时,伊劳拉表示他想要“一名边锋”,但他的需求显然不止于单一的一名新援。
欢迎前往千禧体育场观看威尔士对阵英格兰的比赛,这是一场吉尼斯六国赛(Guinness Men’s Six Nations)赛事,历史、宿敌之争与决定赛季走向的压力在此交汇。
此专属套餐包括官方比赛门票以及两场由传奇评论员 Stuart Barnes、《泰晤士报》的 Charlie Morgan 及一位名人嘉宾主持的活动,为您带来超越开球时刻的极致体验。入住市中心优质四星级酒店,让您能够快速抵达体育场、餐厅并参与赛后讨论。哨响前的深度洞察,哨响后的热烈氛围——每一个细节都将由我们从始至终为您处理。
由 Stuart Barnes 主持 自从退役不再担任飞翼半卫(fly-half)以来,Stuart 成为了《泰晤士报》的专栏作家和比赛分析师,也是英国最犀利的橄榄球评论员之一。
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价格包含
Gomez 在八分钟后不得不被替换,导致 Iraola 在防守端人数不足
• 在卡迪夫湾 Future Inn 四星级酒店入住两晚(含早餐)
• 赛前与传奇评论员 Stuart Barnes、《泰晤士报》资深橄榄球记者 Charlie Morgan 及一位名人嘉宾进行问答
• 周五进入队长训练赛 (Captain’s Run) 的权限
• 官方 A 类门票(下层,试球线区域)
• 主办方提供的欢迎饮品
• 巡回赛纪念品
可选升级:
• 银级款待 (Silver Hospitality) 升级,包含饮品和午餐
Monday July 27 2026 | the times 体育
Craig Lord
一名在这些上升年份中一直接近皮蒂团队的人士告诉《泰晤士报》: “在过去的几年里,他面临了一些非常严峻的挑战,但他仍然相信自己能够在起跳时展现出某种形式的最佳状态。也许他能做到。这是一个分水岭时刻。他内心很矛盾。这需要予以解决——而且在目标明确且任务完成之前,所有那些家庭问题的干扰都需要从他的生活中移除。”
[[IMG_XXXX]] 兰姆齐-皮蒂在获得 100 米铜牌后被妻子霍莉亲吻,左图
马歇尔目前在澳大利亚执教,
兰姆齐-皮蒂最近搬到了伦敦,目前在奥运泳池由英国另一位顶尖女教练丽莎·贝茨指导,而他与霍莉也期待着他们在 12 月迎来第一个孩子,是一个女孩。
在东京奥运会前,马歇尔曾表示:“当孩子出生后,在睡眠不足以及这对恢复产生的影响方面会存在挑战,但没有什么是通过一次深入的交谈无法解决的。”
在这种情况下,问题是:这一次谁来引导这次交谈,并确保所有道路都指向让兰姆齐-皮蒂在 2028 年洛杉矶奥运会前恢复到我们所熟知的冠军状态?“如果亚当想以夺金所需的身体状态前往洛杉矶,那么那个‘主队’将至关重要,”该人士表示。“或者,必须提出这样一个问题:是否到了该离开的时候?”
QUINN ROONEY/GETTY IMAGES
埃文斯摆脱紧张情绪,为苏格兰创造历史
当安加拉德·埃文斯在托尔克罗斯国际泳池夺冠时,现场气氛达到了顶点。她夺得了苏格兰自蛙泳项目于 1930 年加入英联邦运动会以来,在该项目中获得的首枚金牌。她的胜利也让东道国在 100 米项目中获得了自 2006 年克斯蒂·巴尔福获得铜牌以来的首枚奖牌(无论颜色如何)。
在进入决赛后,曾公开谈论自己深受紧张情绪困扰的埃文斯表示,她要“去看《恋爱岛》(Love Island) 以转移注意力”。但在昨晚,当她以 1分 6.07秒 的成绩领先于南非的艾米·坎尼夺冠时,主场球迷们得到了认可。
在埃文斯向看台致辞后,现场爆发了巨大的欢呼声:“我只想说谢谢,因为怀疑和负面想法很容易影响我的心态,而当我走出来时,你们真正地激励了我,给了我所需的动力。”
W
最好——但富里 对阵约书亚将 定义传奇地位
John Westerby
“我们已经签署了合同。一切都办好了。”这是埃迪·赫恩(Eddie Hearn)周六晚上在吉达的拳击场上说的话,当时安东尼·约书亚(Anthony Joshua)在第二回合戏剧性地击败了克里斯蒂安·普伦加(Kristian Prenga),赫恩在被问及他的拳手与泰森·富里(Tyson Fury)之间期待已久的对决是否现在将举行时,给出了这一答复。
近年来,关于这两位当代英国最知名的重量级拳击手之间对决的传闻起伏不定,以至于拳击迷们只有在两人真正走进同一个拳击场时才会相信这场比赛真的在进行。但约书亚履行了他的约定,在第一回合中他被名不见经传的阿尔巴尼亚拳手普伦加两次击倒,但顽强生存了下来。在教练组的激励下,他在第二回合迅速掌控局面,用一套极其凶猛的“右-左-右”组合拳将普伦加击倒,这让人们想起了让他两度成为世界冠军的强大力量。
约书亚与富里的这场对决可能是英国拳击历史上最赚钱的比赛之一,具体细节尚未决定,尽管约书亚明确表示希望在英国本土举行。“除非AJ和我本人同意,否则这场比赛不可能不在英格兰举行,”赫恩说道。“我们签署了一份具有法律约束力的合同,这经历了漫长、漫长的谈判过程。”
在他击败……之后
Stuart Barnes
如果奥德修斯发现自己处于戴夫·雷尼 (Dave Rennie) 的处境,他会怎么想?雷尼是新西兰队的主教练,他的队员们在明年的世界杯淘汰赛中,注定将与强大的南非队以及锋利且危险的法国队正面碰撞。
他可能会说:“让我们离开抽签中这个致命的半区吧。让我们寻找更轻松的草场,好让我们的伙计们能顺利度过淘汰赛的噩梦。”
有时候需要挺身而战,有时则需要果断撤离。雷尼就像一个披着传统基维教练外衣的奥林匹克运动员,要求他的队员们保持乐观。全黑队在他的带领下开局良好,这激发了人们的希望,认为新西兰队在即将到来的、被誉为“最伟大宿敌”的南非测试赛系列赛中能够具有竞争力;且能在这场较量中避免惨败,并为在 2027 世界杯上策划胜利做好准备。
通往世界杯奖杯的道路充满艰辛。就目前而言,考虑到赛事的抽签情况,新西兰队如果能进入决赛,本身就是一次令人惊叹的冒险。首先是小组赛对阵东道主,他们巨大的竞争对手澳大利亚;然后,如果种子队能如预期般从小组出线,他们将在四分之一决赛面对最强且最狡猾的对手南非;紧接着是半决赛,对手可能是一支令人生畏的法国队。
奥德修斯认为奥林匹斯众神在针对他,对于新西兰队来说,橄榄球之神似乎也是如此。最顶尖的球队们正为了晋级而激烈地厮杀。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 周六击败 Prenga 后,Joshua 向在尼日利亚车祸中丧生的朋友致敬。在面对 Fury 之前,他需要提高自己的防御能力(左图)
在吉达超级圆顶体育馆(Jeddah Superdome),Joshua 向人群大声呼喊,想看看 Fury 是否在场。Fury 并不在沙特阿拉伯,他在前一天在泰国进行了一场热身赛,在七回合内击败了来自波兰的 46 岁选手 Mariusz Wach。但 Fury 随即在社交媒体上发帖,确认 Joshua 已在他的目标范围内。“英国历史上最大的一场比赛,”他写道,“看看他是否有胆量在 11 月出战。我会准备好。让我们摇滚起来。筹备十余年之久。”
虽然 Joshua 是击败 Prenga 的绝对热门,但一旦失败,无疑会给 Fury 这场比赛带来巨大的不确定性。在 36, 岁这个年纪,考虑到他近期缺乏击败强力对手的记录,失败也将引发人们对其未来的质疑。Joshua 在 12 月的一场表演赛中击败了 YouTuber Jake Paul,但在近两年前的温布利球场输给了 Daniel Dubois。在那次沉重的失败之前,他的四场胜利分别是对阵 UFC 选手 Francis Ngannou、Otto Wallin、Robert Helenius 和 Jermaine Franklin。
同样,Fury 在 2024 年接连输给 Oleksandr Usyk 后,通过击败 Arslanbek Mahmudov(一致判定胜)和 Wach 实现了反弹。他为了 WBC 重量级冠军头衔与 Deontay Wilder 进行的那场扣人心弦的三部曲对决,现在感觉已是很久以前的事了。
Joshua 击败 Paul 的胜利之后,紧接着是……
一边是决赛。与此同时,英格兰可能在前锋与后卫、踢球后奔跑、传球与承受擒抱之间难以找到平衡,但他们的世界杯之路看起来相当有利。在 2023 年,世界顶尖球队将四分之一决赛变成了半决赛,因为最好的四支球队提前一轮就开始激烈厮杀。爱尔兰和法国在四分之一决赛阶段出局,而英格兰和阿根廷则进入了半决赛。英格兰的祈祷几乎再次得到了回应,因为一场均匀落下的雨使得史蒂夫·博思威克 (Steve Borthwick) 的球队几乎在对阵远强于他们的南非队的比赛中闯入决赛。与此同时,新西兰大胜阿根廷——这些南美竞争者如果排除运气因素,根本不具备进入四强资格。最终,世界强队在决赛相遇,南非队捧起了他们的第四座奖杯。
如果澳大利亚在 A 组击败新西兰夺冠(基于南非和法国如预期般赢得各自小组的假设),雷尼 (Rennie) 就可以避免“过早”地在四分之一决赛面对新 Zealand-南非(以及一周后危险的法国队)。监管这项运动的神灵可能不喜欢这样,但赛事的目的是什么:是为了赢得冠军,还是为了在面对南非或法国队时作为英勇的失败者离开赛场?如果新西兰输给澳大利亚会怎样?首先,无论如何,获胜都不会简单。袋鼠队将被他们不老对手的斗志点燃。他们具备打大比赛的能力,但新任教练莱斯·基斯 (Les Kiss) 接手的球队并不具备赢得整个赛事的结构。澳大利亚的胜利将点亮整个赛事,并让雷尼的队员走上一条没有法国和南非这类怪兽出没的道路。
其他影响是什么?一场简单的 16 强赛之后——极有可能——将是一场四分之一决赛的较量。
这场灾难性的车祸在约书亚 (Joshua) 为与普伦加 (Prenga) 的比赛做准备期间阴影笼罩。在尼日利亚拉各斯-伊巴丹高速公路 (Lagos-Ibadan Expressway) 上作为乘客旅行时,约书亚的两名朋友在车祸中丧生,而他在医院接受了相对较轻伤势的治疗。他带着两名朋友的名字进入赛 ring——体能教练西纳·加米 (Sina Ghami) 和私人教练拉蒂夫·阿约德莱 (Latif Ayodele)——就印在他的领襟上。赛后,他还向他的朋友及其家属致敬。“这不仅仅是拳击力量,”他在谈到胜利时说,“那是精神,那是 Latz,那是 Sina,那是这些家庭。”
当约书亚在第一轮 20 秒内被击倒在地时,赫恩 (Hearn) 感觉到与 菲里 (Fury) 对阵的前景正在溜走,并怀疑约书亚在经历了近几个月的重重创伤后,是否太快回到了赛场。“没有人能想象他过去七个月经历了什么,”赫恩说,“在第一轮期间,我在想,‘他回来得太早了。’但他在应对这么多悲痛和痛苦时,需要通过拳击来帮他度过难关。他是个坚强的男人,他喜欢独立处理自己的问题。我不是说那是正确的方法,但那是他的方式。今晚能站上赛场就已经令人惊叹了。”但约书亚在第二轮的反弹提醒人们他的能力,以及为什么他依然具有如此大的票房吸引力。“当你第一轮被击倒几次,看起来职业生涯可能要结束时,他必须挖掘潜能,”赫恩说,“起身继续战斗,就像他一直以来做的那样,就像他过去七个月所做的那样。”约书亚在与普伦加的第一轮比赛中展现出的弱点将
毫无疑问,这已让富里(Fury)心痒难耐。在过去的一年里,约书亚(Joshua)一直在与乌西克(Usyk)及其教练列戈尔·戈卢布(Iegor Golub)合作,后者在那个令人受挫的第一回合之后,在维持约书亚的注意力方面做得非常出色。但他们知道,在面对富里之前,必须针对普伦加(Prenga)所暴露出的防守弱点进行改进。当这两位前世界冠军相遇时,将没有任何金腰带在线,且两人都已过了各自的巅峰期。无论是约书亚还是富里,在进入这场对决之前,近期记录都称不上亮眼。但这不太可能降低人们对这场筹备已久的比赛的广泛兴趣——这场比赛无论他们之前的成就如何,都将决定这两位标志性英国重量级拳击手的历史地位。
与英格兰队的对阵。新西兰人,请在其中选择: 是对阵英格兰还是南非?到了半决赛,阿根廷或者爱尔兰与苏格兰小组赛的胜者将在假设的情况下等待全黑队(All Blacks)。伦尼(Rennie)的球队将在抽签较为轻松的一侧处于巡航模式。赢得世界杯并不意味着必须赢得每一场比赛。南非队已经证明了这一点。也许当新西兰在 2019. 年的小组赛中击败他们时,他们并没有像我们想象中那样沮丧。全黑队为自己争取到了在半决赛面对强大的英格兰前锋群的机会,而威尔士队则被拉西·埃拉斯姆斯(Rassie Erasmus)的球队横扫。 当然,伦尼会竭尽全力赢得世界杯。这并不是要放弃与澳大利亚队之间备受瞩目的关键小组赛,而是或许将其作为测试阵容组合的机会,因为他们深知一次失败绝非世界末日。
Molly Hudson
一级方程式赛车
特派记者,
匈牙利赛道
世界冠军兰多·诺里斯在布达佩斯的一场混乱比赛中,结束了长达 259 天没有分站冠军的低迷期。这场比赛可能在未来证明是对基米·安东内利夺得本赛季总冠军至关重要的一战。麦拉伦的“木瓜规则”(允许车手之间公平竞争)在上一赛季占据主导,但在此次比赛中并未体现,因为在奥斯卡·皮亚斯特里被卡洛斯·赛恩斯撞击后,诺里斯幸运地取得了领先。但这名英国车手拥有更快的速度,并最终赢得了实至名归的胜利,这是他自去年 11 月在英特拉格斯赛道获胜以来的首场胜利。马克斯·维斯塔潘获得亚军,鉴于他一直对自己的红牛赛车抱怨不已,这一结果令他自己也感到困惑。“我仍然不明白我们怎么只拿了第二,”他说。安东内利获得第三名——尽管梅赛德斯赛车在整个周末的表现都不尽人意,但他不知怎么地竟然跑在了他最大的冠军竞争对手刘易斯·汉密尔顿之前。
正如安东内利的车队领队托托·沃尔夫所说:“在周六早上,刘易斯才是那个[被预期]能赢得这场比赛的人。”在这个对汉密尔顿夺冠希望至关重要的周末,他在排位赛中因阻挡皮亚斯特里而被罚退 3 个发车位,心情低落,随后在正赛中又因在维修区超速(超过 80km/h 限速 0. 1km/h)而被判定违规。这次 5 秒的处罚使他掉到第五名,排在法拉利队友查尔斯·勒克莱尔之后,目前他在积分榜上落后安东内利 50 分。对于诺里斯来说,第一圈出现了一个在他上赛季就困扰过他的不愉快问题——未能将杆位领先优势维持住。他在 24 小时前通过一圈精彩表现所做的一切努力,都在 2 号弯跑宽并进入赛道脏区时化为乌有,从而让皮亚斯特里夺回领先地位。法拉利选择了软胎,而其他竞争对手则使用中性胎——汉密尔顿使用的是一套新胎,而勒克莱尔使用的是周六排位赛的旧胎。勒克莱尔由于抓地力不足,掉到了第五名,并失去了对队友的领先位置。
乔治·拉塞尔遇到了另一个问题,为他本赛季长长的运气不佳和机械故障清单又增加了一项——在他尝试起步时,他的新动力单元触发了防熄火机制,导致他掉到了 21 位。“看来乔治又遇到了另一个问题,”沃尔夫说。“看起来他只给了大约 10 %的油门,但整个系统却达到了最高转速,随后他松开油门,车子就熄火了。我对[车队]出现太多失误感到非常不快。”拉塞尔的夺冠希望似乎正在消逝;他最终追回至第七名,但失去了更多的冠军积分。匈牙利赛道经常被描述为“没有围墙的摩纳哥”,几乎不是一个理想的追回名次的地方。车队和车手此前预计,今年可用的“超越”模式将不如上赛季的 DRS 强大,这使得赛道位置成为关键。
汉密尔顿在第 14 圈率先进站,尽管不得不超越阿维德·林德布拉德,但他认为自己完美地利用了“undercut”策略(比竞争对手早一圈进站并利用新胎)。维斯塔潘在他们之后出站,但在 1, 号弯完成了一次相当精彩的双重超越,从两人内侧切入。这两辆车的车队无线电沟通截然不同,维斯塔潘的赛车工程师称赞车手的这次超越“非常特别”,而汉密尔顿则为丢掉位置而道歉,因为他知道在比赛接下来的阶段他将被困在红牛赛车之后。诺里斯在皮亚斯特里身后同样感到沮丧,他认为自己的速度更快。在赛恩斯介入之前,尽管他在无线电中抱怨,但很长一段时间里,他似乎无法证明这一点。这名威廉姆斯车手当时正被套圈,
但当时他也在与一辆阿斯顿·马丁争夺位置,并与皮亚斯特里发生了轮对轮的碰撞。“滚开,你这个该死的白痴,”皮亚斯特里说道,这是这位澳大利亚车手罕见地表现出真正的愤怒。赛因斯因造成碰撞而被处以 5 秒的处罚。这次事故使皮亚斯特里损失了相当一部分圈速,并让诺里斯获得了一个意想不到的超越进站(overcut)机会,从而有效地取得了领先。“顺便说一句,你们能把这件事考虑在内真是太好了,谢谢,”皮亚斯特里告诉他的比赛工程师,他认为自己本该被允许占据那个位置。
[[IMG_XXXX]] 诺里斯在领奖台上享受他的时刻,而右侧的汉密尔顿因在维修区超速 0.1km/h 被处以 5 秒处罚。他在上方图片中重新回到赛道,领先于冠军竞争对手安东内利(左),但最终被降至第五名,落后于诺里斯。当被告知轮胎需要支撑到比赛结束时,他回答道:“噢伙计,现在千万别他妈跟我说话。”
而事实证明他们并不需要那样做,因为一次变速箱故障导致皮亚斯特里驶离赛道,与两辆凯迪拉克赛车一同退赛。由于电子蓝旗系统出现故障,几名垫底车手在比赛中造成了混乱。考虑到诺里斯在卫冕冠军之路上一直饱受可靠性差和麦拉伦车队苦苦挣扎的困扰,他大概配得上这份运气。“我今天的配速大概是我有史以来最好的。这辆车开起来感觉太棒了,而且我很有信心,”他说道,并取得了挂有 1 号车号后的首场胜利。
两辆法拉利赛车在皮亚斯特里退赛引发的虚拟安全车期间进站,而汉密尔顿被迫放弃了他认为在安东内利面前赢得的位置,因为回放显示梅赛德斯车手在出维修区时处于领先。
汉密尔顿认为自己最初根本不应该进站,他更倾向于维持赛道位置,即使可能在维斯塔潘面前丢失一个位置,但尝试保持在安东内利之前。“指令在进入维修区之前那一刻才传达,我没有时间争论,”汉密尔顿说。“你必须信任已经做出的决定。事后看来,我的轮胎完全没问题。”
随后出现了现在已经习以为常的景象:44 号车——汉密尔顿——正接受赛会干事调查。
与此同时,已确认一级方程式赛车(Formula 1)将于 10 月 2-4, 日重返马来西亚,由雪邦国际赛道承办巴林大奖赛。该赛道最后一次举办 F1 赛事是在 2017, 年,今年将在巴林王国的资金支持下重新回归赛历。由于中东地区持续的冲突,无法在巴林本土举行比赛。“一次又一次,这项运动证明了其适应、寻找解决方案并交付的能力,为所有关注一级方程式赛车的人创造了一个激动人心的时刻,”F1 总裁兼首席执行官斯特凡诺·多梅尼卡利说道。
虽然关于是否在卡塔尔和阿布扎比举行比赛的决定要到赛季后期才会做出,但应急方案包括重返欧洲,其中伊莫拉是最可能的目的地。
S1 51 环法自行车赛 体育
完赛排名
完赛排名
L Norris
1hr 39min 56.180s
McLaren
McLaren
M Verstappen Red Bull
M Verstappen Red Bull
Red Bull
K Antonelli Mercedes
K Antonelli Mercedes
Mercedes
C Leclerc Ferrari
C Leclerc Ferrari
Ferrari
L Hamilton Ferrari
L Hamilton Ferrari
I Hadjar Red Bull
I Hadjar Red Bull
G Russell Mercedes
G Russell Mercedes
L Lawson Racing Bulls
L Lawson Racing Bulls
Racing Bulls
N Hülkenberg Audi
A Lindblad Racing Bulls
G Bortoleto Audi
P Gasly Alpine
P Gasly Alpine
Alpine
L Stroll Aston Martin
F Alonso Aston Martin
F Colapinto Alpine
E Ocon Haas
Haas
A Albon Williams
C Sainz Williams
O Piastri McLaren
总积分榜
+15.080s
+18.728s
+23.840s
L Norris McLaren
+24.540s
+55.488s
+57.503s
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
C Leclerc 1:22.000 最快圈速
车队积分榜
2 lap
2 lap
2 lap
2 lap
+2 lap
续接封底
凭借更强壮的体格,范德普尔比身穿黄衫的选手稍微强一些,但波加查在共同协作中也贡献了力量。在还剩两公里时,主车群在三名 Decathlon 车手的带动下,正在蚕食两名领先者的优势。十秒变成了八秒,然后是五秒。当领先者最后一次绕过里沃利路 (Rue de Rivoli) 进入香榭丽舍大街 (Champs-Élysées) 时,他们的领先优势仅剩四秒。波加查率先崩溃,极度疲劳迫使他在主车群追上他的一瞬间减速。那是在距离终点 200 米的地方。范德普尔似乎就知道结局将如此。他仍有余力。就在追击者即将将其超越时,他进行了最后一次加速。菲利普森 (Philipsen) 也是追击小组的一员,但范德普尔的最后一次冲刺让他保持在领先位置。菲利普森在冲刺的同时,依然留意着他的队友。当显然范德普尔将能守住领先时,菲利普森没有强行超越,而是在第二名地盘止步。他自己能赢吗?可能可以。但他明白,在经历了蒙马特的突围以及随后的维持领先之骑后,让范德普尔获胜是正确的。这是一个非凡比赛结尾的非凡时刻。“这是一场不可思议的战斗,”范德普尔说。“极其艰难,能与世界上最顶尖的车手并肩,我对塔德伊表示敬意。我以为我们会被追上,但在最后 500 米我低头猛冲,等着其他人超过我,但那并没有发生。”在失败中,波加查的表现令人钦佩。他比赛时就像一个试图赢得首场比赛的孩子。在参加第七次环法自行车赛的最后一个赛段时,骑行得就像从未赢过比赛一样。在这种情况下失利不会困扰他。他倾尽了所有。而且他并非空手而归。这是他的第五次环法冠军,使他与雅克·安克蒂尔 (Jacques Anquetil)、埃迪·默克斯 (Eddy Merckx)、贝尔纳·伊诺 (Bernard Hinault) 和米格尔·印杜拉因 (Miguel Induráin) 并列。这种新地位并非他所追求的。对他而言,五次环法冠军与四次冠军没有太大区别。自从 2019 年突破以来,他的光芒如此之盛,以至于我们自然会好奇他究竟有多强。许多人可能已经忘记,他的第一次环法是在 2020 年的一个九月周日结束的。新冠疫情将环赛从盛夏的家园推迟到了秋季的临时场地。
219pts
379pts
[[IMG_XXXX]] 波加查经过凯旋门
第 21 赛段(巴黎 — 香榭丽舍大街,88.7km):
1, M van der Poel (荷兰, Alpecin-Premier Tech) 1hr 58min 49sec; 2, J Philipsen (比利时, Alpecin-Premier Tech); 3, M Pedersen (丹麦, Lidl-Trek) 均为同一时间。
总成绩 1, T Pogacar (斯洛文尼亚, UAE Team Emirates-XRG) 73:56:26; 2, R Evenepoel (比利时, Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe) 6:26; 3, I del Toro (墨西哥, UAE Team Emirates-XRG) 9:42。领先英国车手第 9, T Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5 Pro) 29:28。
积分榜 1, Pedersen 559。登山王 1, R Carapaz (厄瓜多尔, EF Education-EasyPost) 156pts。最佳年轻车手 1, Del Toro 74:06:08。
获胜次数。他故事中的所有细节才决定了一切,这使他与所有其他自行车冠军都截然不同,可能唯一的例外是默克斯(Merckx)。例如,44年前,我第一次在7月的最后一个星期日站在香榭丽舍大街上。那是伊诺(Hinault)第四次参加环法,那一年人们对他未能在前三周赢得任何一个公路赛阶段而议论纷纷。随后伊诺在香榭丽舍大街赢得了胜利,平息了喧嚣。而当波加查尔赢得环法时,他的总冠军头衔通常伴随着三场、四场、五场甚至六场分段胜利。与许多其他环法冠军不同,这场为期三周的比赛仅仅是波加查尔统治力的一个方面。他参加的大多数单日经典赛都能获胜,所有的一周赛也能制霸。他在法兰德斯的鹅卵石爬坡路段获胜,随后在阿登陡峭的短坡获胜,并在托斯卡纳的白色街道(Strade Bianche)未铺砌道路上获胜。他就像费德勒在红土场和草地一样游刃有余,像老虎伍兹在乔治亚州的松林和苏格兰的林克赛场同样出色。对于某些人来说,他无可争议的统治力削弱了比赛的刺激感。人们怎么可能
一场为期三周的比赛,如果在第一周结束时我们就觉得已经知道了获胜者,那它还会有趣吗?相反的观点是,他通过进攻获胜,而他的比赛方式本身就具有某种天然的刺激感。谁能将他在周五第19赛段在阿尔普迪埃兹(Alpe d’Huez)的胜利描述为除令人振奋之外的任何其他感觉?人们对他处理非凡成功及其随之而来的挑战的方式充满巨大的钦佩。在 2020 年他赢得 La Planche des Belles Filles 的个人计时赛后,被他击败的两名骑手罗格利奇(Roglic)和汤姆·杜穆林(Tom Dumoulin)在纪录片《黄色代码》(Code Yellow)中质疑了那次表现的真实性。他们的言论是在比赛结束后的第一时间发表的,当时他们正处于震惊状态。被拉开 1:21 的杜穆林说道:“一分半钟!我想不出任何 1 个方案,能让我速度快那么一分半钟。”罗格利奇同样不敢相信。“差距太大了,”他说,“他们必须计算出你需要多少功率才能达到那个成绩。那是另一个世界的骑行。”这部纪录片在波加查(Pogacar)首次赢得环法赛六个月后推出,波加查在谈到这些评论时说:“很伤心。”杜穆林现在的态度有所转变。去年 10 月在谈到波加查时,他说:“我喜欢看他比赛。他也许是有史以来最伟大的骑手,能看到最强者赢得几乎每一场比赛是很特别的。”在次年的环法赛中,波加查在一次个人计时赛中再次交付了顶级表现,并以 44 秒之差击败了罗格利奇。这一次没有抱怨,人们只是对他这种级别的实力有了更好的理解。尽管如此,这就是骑行运动,许多人依然像紧握十字架一样地坚持着他们的怀疑,无法考虑这个人也许是在用正确的方式获胜。在世界巡回赛(World Tour)的七年时间里,波加查展现了最伟大冠军所具备的大部分素质。他赢得了前两次环法赛,2020 和 2021 年,并且认为这比实际情况要简单。在 2022 年第 11 赛段 Galibier 山的早段坡道上,他被罗格利奇和约纳斯·温格高(Jonas Vingegaard)算计并击败,随后在 Granon 山落后对手近三分钟。温格高在次年再次击败了他。正是在那时,波加查决定审视自己所做的一切,看看哪里可以改进。他在 2024 年的环法赛中表现卓越,在赢得最终胜利的过程中夺得六个赛段冠军。他的所有队友都提到他现在放松了多少,而且很明显,他现在是一位出色的团队领导者。他将巴塞罗那赛段的胜利赠送给最年轻的队友艾萨克·德尔托罗(Isaac del Toro),是第一周的亮点之一;随后在倒数第二天,他牺牲了再次赢得赛段冠军的可能性,以便让德尔托罗能够保住代表最佳年轻骑手的白色骑行衫以及总成绩第三名。我今年环法赛最深刻的记忆之一,是波加查在周五攀登阿尔普迪埃兹时与亚当·耶茨(Adam Yates)汇合的时刻。当波加查在追击理查德·卡拉帕斯(Richard Carapaz)时,耶茨的状态并不太好,但波加查没有惊慌,而是让耶茨尽力而为,随后波加查才加速离去。很快,他再次缩小了与卡拉帕斯的差距,并在最后一公里将其超越。他允许耶茨在这次胜利中发挥作用的方式既聪明又细心。不难理解为什么他的队友如此推崇他。
周一 July 27 2026 | 泰晤士报 体育
荷兰骑手马修·凡德普尔(Mathieu van der Poel,右),来自 Alpecin-Premier Tech 队,在香榭丽舍大街经历了一场惊心动魄的冲刺决赛后,赢得了环法赛的最后一个赛段。
Peter Rutzler
巴黎圣日耳曼愿意出售 法国边锋布拉德利·巴科拉,但 要求 1.45 亿英镑 (£145 million) 的转会费。 据信利物浦和阿森纳 对巴科拉感兴趣,但巴黎圣日耳曼 并没有积极计划出售这名 23 岁球员,且不希望低价 将其出售。这家欧洲冠军俱乐部 在内部将最近的交易作为其 估值的通胀基准,包括加盟 曼彻斯特城的埃利奥特·安德森(转会费 1.16 亿英镑 £116 million),以及
《泰晤士报》填字游戏 29,605 横向 纵向 奖金方案 29,598
以 1.17 亿英镑 (£117 million) 转会至切尔西的 摩根·罗杰斯。 尽管巴黎圣日耳曼对巴科拉 评价很高,但其主教练路易斯·恩里克 只想要那些完全致力于俱乐部的 球员。在过去两届欧冠决赛的 两场胜利中,他都没有首发,且在 德西雷·多埃、奥斯曼·登贝莱和 克维恰·克瓦拉茨赫利亚的竞争中, 他的出场时间被瓜分。巴黎圣日耳曼此前 试图签下 RB 莱比锡的边锋 扬·迪奥曼德。然而,昨天他们 退出了竞争,俱乐部消息人士 称其工资要求“不相称”且 转会费过高。迪奥曼德预计 将加盟皇家马德里。 巴科拉经历了惊人的崛起。 2022 年,他几乎被降入 里昂预备队,但在一次前往 迪拜的行程中闯入了一线队 竞争——在那里,他在卡塔尔 世界杯期间的比赛中面对了利物浦 和阿森纳。到次年夏天,他的
1 西班牙诗歌作者不会出错 (9) 6 围绕着你的人工湿地 (5) 9 在乡村住宅外简短地发现斑点鼹鼠 (7) 10 盛开的报纸引领欧洲愤怒 (7) 11 许多美国人吃什么? (3) 12 马也许很快准备好扔出第一位骑士,同样远吗? (11) 14 在早期英语中揭露钱伯斯的错误 (6) 15 缪斯跟随第二位民主党人,以合理速度前行 (8) 17 一个顶级动物园拼命地将河流动物困在单个细胞中 (8) 19 缺乏位置的常见药物 (6) 22 极好的笑话卡片写关于旧女王 (11) 23 甲壳类动物的内脏完全没煮熟 (3) 25 “某些酒吧饮料”中十二个字母之一 (7) 27 我在拆开的美国糖果中认出的浓烈风味 (7) 28 法官在紧张的冲击下获得成功 (11)
英国偶像会面之路已铺平……但无腰带之争
影响如此之大,以至于他受到了巴黎圣日耳曼的追捧,并以 5000 万欧元 (€50 million)(约 4250 万英镑 £42.5 million)加盟。他为俱乐部出场 152 次,贡献了 39 个进球和 37 次助攻,现在是法国国家队的常客。在今年夏天于北美举行的世界杯上,他参加了国家的全部 8 场比赛,并打入 3 球。 阿森纳最近错过了 罗杰斯,后者以英国纪录转会费从 阿斯顿维拉加盟斯坦福桥。利物浦则关注了迪奥曼-
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STEPHANIE LECOCQ/REUTERS
末日冲刺
大卫·沃尔什 巴黎
借用《麦克白》中马尔库姆的话说:在这届环法自行车赛中,没有什么比它的结束那样令人难忘。终点线设在香榭丽舍大街,那里上演了一场冲刺赛,这可能是我们在巴黎最后一天见过的最精彩的一场。荷兰选手马修·范德波尔在面对其 Alpecin-Premier Tech 队友贾斯珀·菲利普森的追击时勉强维持住了领先,但这仅仅是对一个极其扣人心弦的故事的简化描述。
在去年的环法赛之前,最后一个赛段大多是仪式性的比赛,最终以冲刺手们在终点线前的混乱冲锋而告终。十二个月前,组委会更改了路线,在市区内引入了一个环路,其中包括蒙马特高地(Côte de la Butte Montmartre),这是一个艰苦的一公里爬坡路段,且必须挑战三次。这给了非冲刺手车手们一个机会:看看是否能在爬坡时拉开差距,然后尝试顶住大部队的追击。范德波尔和塔代伊·波加查就是昨天无法抵挡这一诱惑的两个人。在第三次
de,他也吸引了皇家马德里的关注。 与此同时,尤文图斯已接洽约翰·斯通斯,这位 32 岁的英格兰中后卫在离开曼城后成为了自由球员。切尔西也考虑过签下斯通斯,由于伤病,他在过去两个赛季中合计仅出场 20 场联赛。他曾帮助曼城赢得了 6 个英超冠军、1 个欧冠冠军、2 个足总杯冠军和 5 个联赛杯冠军。
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第 29,598 号奖金猜字谜的获胜者为: M Richardson, Clifford, West Yorkshire JM Bryson, Conwy, Gwynedd B Knott, London W12 R Olswang, London SW14 J Siklos, Harrogate, North Yorkshire
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一枚铜牌与与家人决裂的“代价”
“对不起,伙计们,”亚当·拉姆齐-皮蒂(Adam Ramsay-Peaty)周六站在格拉斯哥的泳池边说道,声音颤抖,胸前挂着英联邦运动会男子100米蛙泳的铜牌。“这很难,”他含泪继续说道,“因为我知道自己有多努力。我知道我经历了多少烂事,而那并不是我的错。这确实造成了影响。”我们是怎么走到这一步的?任何关注这位三届奥运冠军故事的人都在问这个问题,而且我们指的不是他未能夺金。那确实令人失望,但真正引起担忧的是他对结果的反应,以及他似乎将问题归咎于泳池之外的事实。“那些发表评论和阅读头条新闻的人必须审视自己。忽视这一点是要付出代价的,”拉姆齐-皮蒂说道,以免我们对他所指之意产生任何怀疑。自从他在 2024. 年与名厨戈登·拉姆齐(Gordon Ramsay)的女儿霍莉·拉姆齐(Holly Ramsay)订婚以来,这类头条新闻就接踵而至。
从那时起,这位游泳冠军的生活发生了翻天覆地的变化。现在,除了努力维持其在运动顶端地位的巨大压力外,他还成为了一个生活在公众关注下的名流家庭的一员。这不仅仅是他发现自己身处富人之中,更在于随之而来的曝光度、文化、规则和预期。贝克汉姆一家——拉姆齐一家的亲密朋友——已经率先示范了这一切,所以即使这两个家庭非常不同,我们大致也知道情况如何。伴侣们加入这个圈子,参与这场游戏,并且(除非他们叫尼古拉·佩尔茨)对被接纳感到感激。你可以感觉到,拉姆齐-皮蒂当时很高兴收到邀请。
任何在他这个水平竞争的运动员,根据定义,都被要求过一种简单的禁欲生活;如今他 31 岁,拥有 20 年清苦生活的经历,他坠入了爱河,与此同时,被引入了一个由设计师服装、私人会员俱乐部、早午餐和 Instagram 拍照机会组成的精致世界,而这对于这个来自尤托克瑟特(Uttoxeter)的年轻人来说,是此前完全不了解的生存方式。
问题在于,他原本就有一个充满爱的原生家庭,那是平凡且不光彩的类型,他们留在幕后做出牺牲,好让孩子能做他们从未能做到的事情,而且——如果这些孩子是未来的游泳冠军——他们每天凌晨 4 点无论天气如何都会起床开车送孩子去训练(以拉姆齐-皮蒂为例,从他位于斯塔福德郡的家中到德比的一家游泳俱乐部的车程为 40 分钟)。在每一位有志于成为奥运选手的运动员背后,都有一位乐于付出额外努力的父母,而且每位运动员都将这种牺牲视为至高无上的财富,他也是如此。有无数他灿烂笑容的照片,他搂着父母卡罗琳(Caroline)和马克(Mark)——卡罗琳经常把他的最新奖牌挂在脖子上。然而,在他订婚后不久,照片和沟通突然中断了。
出问题的第一个迹象是传闻称,当霍莉的母亲塔娜(Tana)和维多利亚·贝克汉姆(Victoria Beckham)受邀参加在索霍农庄(Soho Farmhouse)举办的霍莉单身派对时,卡罗琳却没有收到邀请。随后,皮蒂夫妇两人都没有出席 2025 年 12 月的婚礼,只有他的妹妹贝瑟尼(Bethany)代表家庭出席。自那时起
这段故事正稳步向布鲁克林·佩尔茨-贝克汉姆(Brooklyn Peltz-Beckham)的情况发展。据说卡罗琳(Caroline)已被“禁止进入泳池”,且在他职业生涯中首次未能前往格拉斯哥观看儿子的比赛。据称,贝瑟尼(Bethany)不再与霍莉(Holly)说话,亚当(Adam)同样地不再与他的兄弟们沟通。与此同时,亚当刚刚以他新婚后的姓氏拉姆齐-皮蒂(Ramsay-Peaty)参加比赛,仿佛在强调他正在开启一段新生活。周六在格拉斯哥的看台上,唯一观看他赢得铜牌的人是由于怀孕的妻子。人们禁不住将佩尔茨-贝克汉姆的疏远与拉姆齐-皮蒂的情况进行比较。这两次决裂都如此极端。两者都涉及一名新婚青年与无法理解自己究竟做错了什么的家人断绝关系。而且两者都散发出一种想要重新开始、抹除不便或略感尴尬之事的氛围。
在拉姆齐-皮蒂一家的情况下,感觉皮蒂一家位于厄托克塞特(Uttoxeter)的家中与他们在萨里郡(Surrey)新买的 £5 million 住宅之间相隔极远。但这也是为什么这与贝克汉姆家的决裂截然不同。除了数十年的支持外,让这件事更加令人心酸的,是皮蒂父母相对谦卑的处境和期望。2025, 11 月,在亚当单身派对的那个晚上,卡罗琳留在家里照顾他前段感情的儿子乔治(George)。至于关于她没被邀请参加单身女派对的传闻,我想你会发现她其实更愿意留在幕后,发挥作用,做普通母亲所做的事情。与她因周六未能观看儿子游泳而感到的失望相比,如果新宝宝出生时她不再被需要,那份悲伤将无法比拟。任何怀疑这次疏离程度之深的人,只需看一段在 2024 年巴黎奥运会前发布的视频,视频中亚当在看着家人在赛场上为他祝福。他的母亲说:“我们爱你,我们只希望你快乐……当事情进展不顺时,你要知道你随时可以回家,我最喜欢看你躺在沙发上,两脚翘在边缘,来吃点蛋糕或燕麦条。”正是那个“两脚翘在边缘”的细节最令人动容。
了,”他说。 “我已经 不爱你一段时间了”
“你在未来五年里怎么规划自己的生活?” 人们问这个问题是为了衡量你对生活的追求。 如果在 2021 年你问我这个问题,我的答案将与我如今的生活几乎没有任何相似之处。我现在是一名三岁孩子的单身母亲,住在斯塔福德郡(Staffordshire)的一栋由我独立购买的房子里,从事自由撰稿人工作。对我来说,我们的家庭虽然小,但却完美地构建在一起,尽管这并非我一定会为我们两人选择的生活。
五年前,我对家庭生活的愿景是传统的。那时我与交往多年的男友住在伦敦南部的一套一居室公寓里,为了在备孕过程中确定排卵期,我们不得不使用排卵试纸。我们计划搬出伦敦买房,可能会选择一个通勤县,而且我还在考虑,一旦期待已久的宝宝到来,如果可能的话,我想减少工作天数。我们也讨论过未来的婚姻,但或许是某种预兆,戒指从未真正出现。
我在 2022 年 1 月怀孕,女儿于 10 月出生。在那之后几周,我的男友消失了。并非字面意义上的失踪,而是隐喻上的。他最后一次出现大概是在我怀孕的最后几天,但回想起来,他在孕期就已经表现出与我疏离的明显迹象。那个我想与之共同构建模范生活的男人已经不复存在了。对我而言,直到今天,他是我在哀悼的幽灵,尽管他并没有死。“我不再爱你了,”有一天,当我质问他手机上弹出的另一段与女性调情的暧昧信息时,他几乎带着一种解脱感说道,“而且我已经不爱你一段时间了。”
在他坦白后的几秒钟里,我的内心在冲突的情绪中挣扎:震惊、厌恶和恐慌。我们的女儿患有肠绞痛,而我被诊断出患有产后抑郁症。我快崩溃了。(我当时和现在都在想,是否正是因为这个他才想离开?)在经历了最初的号啕大哭、愤怒和咒骂之后,我性格中现实的一面占据了上风——我想所有母亲都能对此产生共鸣。那是一种生存本能,为了我和我的女儿。我恳求他留下,甚至不一定是为了挽救我们的爱情,我只是需要有人帮我度过新生儿生活接下来的几个月。起初他答应了。但在短短几周内,很明显他心不在焉。在一次绝望而清醒的时刻,我再次与他对质。也许如果我逼他一把,他可能会意识到自己将失去什么(但他始终没有意识到)。
在 2022 年圣诞节之前,我搬回西米德兰兹(West Midlands)与母亲同住。当我们帮他收拾车子时,我对朋友说:
“我的生活现在结束了。”从各方面来看,事实的确如此。我那个在伦敦光鲜杂志社全职工作、与忠诚男友同居、无忧无虑的三十多岁生活结束了。我现在成了母亲,带着新生儿搬回老家,并且面临着可能再也无法在杂志界工作的现实——而那是我从青少年时期起就充满热情追求的职业。所有这些事情,加上肠绞痛和产后抑郁症,在很多方面都让人感到难以承受。“我不想再这样下去了,我做不到,”有一天,我一边摇晃着女儿入睡,一边流着泪对母亲说。“你能的,”她说,“因为你必须做到。”
为人母亲最初几个月伴随而来的认同危机是众所周知的。我的身体不再属于我自己:它被切开,流血,渗漏,肿胀。正是在感觉自己像个陌生人般地住在自己的皮囊里时,一个我不想要的身份强加在了我身上——单身母亲。一个不被需要、被抛弃的人,一个受害者,一个社会边缘人。我成了一个
3 times2 SOS!我们拥有的一切 都被困在海上 作者:Katie Strick F
在身体上以及情感上,我都成了对自己而言一个陌生的人。 重新认同“单身母亲”这个标签,是我过去三年半生活中的重要部分。在最初的几个月里,我会回避关于伴侣的对话。我觉得揭露自己的婚姻状况,就像是在我所有衣服的胸前烙上了一枚“朱红信”(字母S代表单身,而非A代表通奸)。
被强加在了我身上: 单身母亲
但一旦我对一个人敞开心扉,而对方地反应是同情而非审判,事情就变得容易了。我重新与学校的朋友联系,在托儿所、游泳课和芭蕾舞课的妈妈群体中结交了新朋友,并开始在米德兰兹地区(Midlands)而非伦敦看到了未来的希望。我女儿的父亲偶尔会来看她,我辞去了杂志社的工作,开始为买房存钱。生活在继续,而我作为单身母亲的身份也随之演变。 当你经历创伤性事件时,它会让你变得目光短浅。你
会发现很难意识到自己并非特例。发生在我身上的事,在之前和之后的无数女性身上都发生过,且未来仍会继续发生。当时我深信自己极其不幸,认为这种事不该发生在我身上,而且这并非每天都会发生的事。但遗憾的是,事实正是如此。 我不知道这是否是确认偏差,但似乎每隔几个月就会有另一条关于同一类事情的名人新闻:出演《邪恶》的演员伊森·斯莱特(Ethan Slater)在妻子产后离开她并与亚莉安娜·格兰德(Ariana Grande)约会;喜剧演员皮特·戴维森(Pete Davidson)在孩子出生五个月后结束了与女友的关系;演员巴里·基欧根(Barry Keoghan)在儿子一岁前也做了同样的事。 如今,总的来说,我对自己的生活感到满意。我喜欢和女儿聊天,谈论她的一天,一起吃晚餐,在看电影时蜷缩在沙发上拥抱。她一天天变得更聪明、更有趣、更调皮。我在她身上看到了很多自己的影子。成为她的母亲是一种快乐。 当然,在很多方面,我的生活都围绕着她展开,但哪位母亲不是这样呢?由于她现在在托儿所,而我从事自由职业,这意味着我可以在一天之内完成所有需要或想要做的事。我可以写作,可以运动,可以保持房屋整洁,可以采购食品,还可以每两个月染一次白发。如果我是那种会去做美甲的人,我也能做到。我已经让生活运转了起来。我缩小了自己以适应当下的生活——或者也许是我扩张了。有时生活感觉非常狭小——尤其是我全天不间断工作而没有任何休息时间,然后我们都在晚上 7.30 点上床睡觉时——但我认为很多父母的情况也是如此,而不仅仅是那些单身带娃的人。虽然我的一些朋友可能会抱怨她们的丈夫在照顾孩子、操持家务或男人挫败女人的无数其他方面做得不够(当然,反之亦然,我确定),但我远离了那些闹剧。我尝试过约会,但让另一个人依赖于我以及我的时间,感觉太让人分心了。在很多方面,只依赖我自己要容易得多。我必须这么做,所以我做了,就像我母亲在产后初期对我所说的那样。我经常在思考,当女儿大到足以问我
为什么她的爸爸不和我们住在一起,以及为什么我们不经常见到他时,我会怎么回答。这个问题曾在几个深夜让我难以入眠。我能想到的回答就是,她的妈妈和爸爸曾经相爱,但他现在住在不同的城市,所以我们不能经常见到他。毕竟,这是事实的一个版本。最近几周,我感觉到女儿确实对我们的生活状态有疑问。上周末我们在超市里,她指着模特说:“爸爸在哪里?”我说:“也许这里没有爸爸。”她思考了一会儿,然后回答道:“嗯,也许他只有一个妈妈,就像我一样。”她似乎并不为此感到难过,这让我松了一口气,但我意识到在未来的几年里,她会有更多的疑问。有些人认为我对前任太友好了,但我知道与父母疏离所带来的悲伤,而我不希望
对我女儿来说也是如此。在许多方面,三年半后的我现在依然在恳求他能留下。做一个父亲。我尽可能地为此提供便利。我去火车站接他,安排我们共同的活动,保持友好。我知道我有权让事情变得困难一些——让他自己打 Uber,在时间安排上刁难他,或者面对面时对他冷嘲热讽。但这不符合我的天性。而且老实说,我根本不想费那个劲。有两个说法我认为在很大程度上是正确的:“用善良击败他们”以及“因果报应”。所以,宇宙自有安排。现在,在谈起 2022 年那些黑暗的日子时,我很少会感到难过。但我经常在想,如果有可能前往平行宇宙,我预想中的生活会是什么样子。这种情况偶尔会在我和前任以及女儿在一起度过时光时发生——
这是我们时不时会做的事情。我们会身处游乐场或主题公园,一起对着她做的一件事大笑,在那一刹那,我变成了另一个人,身处另一个地方。但随后我猛然清醒,意识到人生中没有“滑动门”式的转折时刻。有一种名为“金继”(kintsugi)的日本艺术,是用金漆修复破碎的陶器。其哲学认为,破碎与修复是一个物体独特历史的一部分,也是其美感的一部分,而非需要掩盖的东西。我喜欢认为,这就是我对我和女儿遭遇的事情所采取的应对方式:我将其化为了某种美好的事物。
伊朗战争 爆发时 将物品装入 从悉尼出发的 货运集装箱
热浪中 我 轮流穿着 同样的 三件 T恤和 两条 短裤
在从澳大利亚返回英国生活的前四个月里,我和我的伴侣实践了一种新型的极简主义。今年四月,当我们搬进伦敦西南区的新公寓时,我们没有配备那些常见的灯具、靠垫和相框。我们没有把衣柜塞满多年没穿的衣服。而且我们决定不去投资瑜伽垫或板式网球拍——请求借用偶尔需要的东西将是结识新邻居的好方法,对吧?看看我们真正需要的财物竟如此之少,也许会很有趣。如果这件事在当时看来还有那么一点点乐趣,那么现在回想起来,那感觉确实像是很久以前的事了。如果你是近藤麻理惠,拥抱极简主义可能会让你感到自由。但如果,比如说,一场战争爆发并导致航运业陷入混乱,而你所有的世俗财产都“失踪”了,被推测正漂浮在
霍尔姆兹海峡附近,那会怎样?我们的财物实际上并不在海峡里。但在几个月的时间里,它们处于南中国海及其周边地区的某个地方,因为大多数全球航运都受到了伊朗战争的影响。预计该行业将需要数月时间才能恢复,分析师警告称,中断情况可能会持续到年底。由于搬家公司提供的更新并不频繁,我们一直处于一种奇怪的家庭空虚状态。几周前,一辆搬家货车终于开到了——距离我们离开悉尼已经快五个月了,而之前被告知只需要两个月。没有人比我男朋友更祈祷热浪结束,因为他一直看着我轮流穿着同样的三件T恤和两条短裤。起初,家人和朋友们出手相助,给我们带来毛巾、枕头和厨具。我的姐姐好心地把她的自行车借给我用了几周,而我的父母开车过来,后备箱里装满了
我自二十多岁以来就没见过的所有物品。这种团结协作的观念听起来很浪漫——直到你的姐姐想要回她的自行车。那么那些无法借用的东西怎么办?随着复工之日的临近,我的伴侣不得不花 £1,000 购买新西装和衬衫。在收到一封邮件告知我们的集装箱仅到达新加坡后,我们不得不投入更多资金来解决问题。当搬家货车出现时,我考虑过把它拒之门外,因为想到要拆封那些我们刚刚购买的所有重复物品,直到我想起我挺喜欢在那个周末的婚礼上穿一件不同的裙子。只有当少用东西是一种选择时,它才会让人感到解放——否则,这只是昂贵。在接下来的几个月里要跨国搬家?请在行李箱里留出空间放一些工作服和几件参加婚礼的裙子。为了精神健康,在里面藏一个 AirTag 也许也是值得的。
4 周一 2026年7月27日 | 泰晤士报 times2
我 39 岁,是一位身体健康且充满活力的伊比萨岛 DJ。 这就是为什么我做了阿尔茨海默症检测
T
目前已有一种可以评估患痴呆症风险的血液检测。在目睹父亲死于该病后,朱尔斯·卡梅伦 (Jules Cameron) 向安娜·麦克斯泰德 (Anna Maxted) 讲述了她为何决定参加检测。
在她父亲 80 岁生日那一周(“当然,他对此毫不知情”),DJ 兼主持人朱尔斯·卡梅伦在 Instagram 上发布了一段两人随着蓝色兄弟组合 (Blues Brothers) 的《Everybody Needs Somebody to Love》翩翩起舞的快乐视频。她的父亲很有节奏感。她在配文中写道:“阿尔茨海默症可以夺走记忆,但夺不走音乐和他舞动的身影。” 去年二月——即六个月后,也是在他确诊十年后——他去世了。自那时起,39 岁的卡梅伦对自己在未来是否会患上这种病变得非常焦虑,因此她刚刚接受了一项有助于评估风险的先驱性血液检测。这项由一家美国健康公司开发的阿尔茨海默症血液检测 LucentAD pTau217,目前在全英国的 Goodbody 诊所均可提供,具有简单、快速且非侵入性的特点。该检测在诊所的费用为 £479,若由抽血师上门服务则为 £499——不过卡梅伦的检测是免费的。该检测(已在美国的常规临床护理中使用)
旨在评估生物标志物 pTau217 的水平,其含量的升高与阿尔茨海默症的病理特征强相关。其设计目的是在出现认知或记忆担忧时,为医疗专业人员的临床评估提供支持,而非取代完整的医疗诊断。证据表明,针对 pTau217 的血液检测与淀粉样蛋白 PET 扫描和腰椎穿刺一样准确,并且由于提供了一种快速、侵入性较低且更易获得的替代方案,可能会彻底改变阿尔茨海默症的诊断方式。正因如此,一项由 UCL 皇后广场神经学研究所领导的研究,目前正对一项类似的针对 pTau217 的血液检测进行临床试验,该研究从 20 家 NHS 记忆诊所招募了 1,100 名参与者,旨在证明该检测准确、具有成本效益,且适合整合到整个 NHS 记忆服务中心的常规护理中。当卡梅伦和我北伦敦的一家咖啡馆见面讨论她的父亲时,我向她表达了慰问。她用一种黑色幽默来掩饰对父亲患阿尔茨海默症的悲痛。“不过时间太长了——十年之久——所以到最后,你会觉得,‘快点走吧!’”
事实上,这让她心碎。 她将父亲的病情描述为“我生命中最大的悲剧之一”,并生动地描绘了他衰弱过程中特定的恐怖场景。 有一次,她的哥哥把父亲送到伦敦的一个火车站与她见面,但父亲并没有出现在约定的位置。卡梅伦抽泣着到处奔跑,喊道:“帮帮我,有人看到这个人吗?” 45 分钟后,她找到了他。 “他就站在角落里,不知道自己为什么在那里。太可怕了。” 这种心碎的感觉。“他根本没想过看手机。我觉得他就算看到了也不知道怎么打开。” 在朱尔斯十岁之前,她的父亲尤文 (Ewen) 是一名军人(卡梅伦中校,MBE)。 “他是骑兵。他曾率领女王的生日阅兵式,举行阅兵仪式,”卡梅伦自豪地说。他热爱参加同学聚会,准备工作就是把那些模糊的名字写在卡片上,但随着遗忘带来的尴尬摧毁了他的自信,他停止了参加。
他结婚较晚,在四十岁出头时结婚。到卡梅伦成年、开始对父母作为个体的特质感兴趣时,“他已经开始走下坡路了”。她说:“对我来说最悲哀的事情之一是,我觉得我从未真正深入地了解过我的父亲。” 然而,他们之间已经建立起了一种“亲密且充满活力的联系”。曾经有“一种
“真爱就在那里”。在疾病的早期阶段,卡梅伦带她的父亲去旅行,去了泰国和迪拜。当她去北爱尔兰看望父母时,她很快学会了顺从他所说的一切。“爸爸总是认为他在电视上看到的那些人是他在现实生活中的哥们。”电视和广播主持人 Rylan Clark 是他最喜欢的人——在卡梅伦发帖提到这件事后,Rylan 寄来了一段视频信息:“Ewen,我是你的好哥们 Rylan……咱们找时间喝杯啤酒!”
卡梅伦说,这些当然是精选的片段。随着父亲病情的进展,加上其他健康问题的影响以及从金融行业繁忙的工作中退休,“在两分钟内,你会被问十次同一个问题。”
她没有掩饰其中的痛苦。在她发布关于跳舞的帖子中,她写道:“尽管看起来很欢乐,但爸爸最近恶化了很多。让他洗澡或刷牙这样的任务会遇到很大的抵触。当我们试图帮助他时,他会变得非常愤怒。他对我的妈妈尤其容易发脾气,而我妈是他的全职护理员。在过去的十年里,爸爸的阿尔茨海默病让她承受了巨大的压力。她说,只有当我们过去看他们时,她才能感到一点快乐。”
卡梅伦说,他在临终关怀病房中的去世“相当平静”。但当她回忆起在火车站边哭边跑,惊恐地担心父亲走丢等往事时,你能感觉到那种创伤在翻涌。
在他去世后,她用幽默的方式发布关于悲伤的内容(“那个把所有事情都看作是去世父亲给的信号的女孩”——比如知更鸟、贝壳、石头)。她还分享了自己的生活方式改变——例如断食、减少饮酒、在职业允许的情况下尽可能优先保证睡眠、增加运动——以保护她的脑健康。“我想起 [阿尔茨海默病] 的次数比我想承认的要多。我非常害怕得这个病。”
她父亲在服兵役时身体强健,但在离开军队从事更久坐的职业后,“他成了一个工作狂,整天在办公室里,喝大量的咖啡,吃大量的糖”。她补充道:“我看着我爱的人在依然存在于此的同时,慢慢地消失。这种感觉会一直伴随你。”
然而,进行阿尔茨海默病血液检测似乎是一个大胆且勇敢的举动。
“反正我已经对得这个病感到非常焦虑了,”卡梅伦坦率地说道。在谈到她的父亲如何因为“找不到词来表达而变得非常愤怒”时,她补充道,并非完全在开玩笑:“我觉得我就像那样。”
因为她患有 ADHD(注意力缺陷多动障碍),“我已经非常健忘。我的认知功能已经让我很苦恼了。”(重要提示:2024 年发表在《阿尔茨海默病杂志》上的一项系统综述得出结论,“ADHD 可能是某些神经认知障碍的风险因素,尽管证据基础有限,且绝对风险较低。”)
她意识到长期缺乏睡眠可能是有害的,并且会导致与阿尔茨海默病相关的脑内淀粉样蛋白斑块堆积。“我二十多岁的时候从不睡觉,总是出去参加派对,而我现在年纪大了在做 DJ。下周五我在伊比萨岛有一个演出,要从午夜 DJ 到早上六点。” 此外,她说,“我从未停止过思考,从未停下来。”
但她焦虑的主要驱动力是“因为我陪父亲经历过这一切。我对此极其敏感,”她说。“所以每天,当我丢失东西、忘记事情或找不到”
[[IMG_XXXX]] Jules Cameron 在伦敦家中进行血液检测
我看着 我爱的人 慢慢消失, 尽管 他依然在这里
一个词,我立刻就会想,“天呐,这可能是阿尔茨海默病。”我觉得我还是知道了比较好。” 她在抽血检查十天后通过电子邮件收到了结果——这是一个好消息。“他们说可能性很低,因为我的标志物水平较低。” 卡梅伦将报告转发给我,报告中指出,“LucentAD pTau217 有助于确定一名有认知或记忆顾虑的患者是否可能或不可能在脑内出现淀粉样蛋白斑块,而这是阿尔茨海默病的标志。” 结果是以样本中 pTau217 的浓度表示,单位为皮克/毫升 (pg/ml),代表淀粉样蛋白病理的可能性为低 (0.040 pg/ml 或更低)、中等 (0.041-0.089 pg/ml) 或高 (0.090 pg/ml 或更高)。 卡梅伦的结果是 0.016 pg/ml。 随附的一封信确认道,“本次检测没有证据表明有显著的淀粉样蛋白斑块积聚的可能性”,但信中强调,这仅仅是更广泛临床评估的一个组成部分,应由您的医疗专业人员“结合您的症状、病史、认知评估及任何其他相关检查”进行解读。 “听到我的水平不高,我松了一口气,”她说。“令人惊叹的是,这项检测让人们有机会在非常早的阶段就检测出其迹象。” 根据英国阿尔茨海默病研究中心 (Alzheimer’s Research UK) 的数据,22% 的人在就诊于全科医生 (GP) 咨询症状后,在国民医疗服务体系 (NHS) 中等待确诊的时间超过两年。 卡梅伦说,她永远无法完全安心。“因为在日常生活中,我注意到自己的认知功能会出现问题,很难说‘哦,我没问题’。”但她承认——在经历了这一切之后,听到这句话令人欣慰——“这确实让我减轻了一些压力”。 goodbodyclinic.com
坐在厨房里,我和丈夫眉头紧锁地听着他的哥哥详细讲述其婚姻崩溃的过程。他们不再兼容——就像在薄冰上行走一样。我们同情地频频点头。接着,出现了一句含糊的话。有些词我没能完全听清,就在我身体前倾地靠在椅子上时,我丈夫猛地从椅子上跳了起来。“她花了 £54,000!”他尖叫道,而我则被呛得将红酒从鼻子里喷了出来。“花在什么上了?苏格兰的一座城堡?还是去月球旅行?”我的姐夫低头看着桌子,低声说道:“商业课程”。我下意识地用手掩住口,仿佛在慢动作观看一场车祸,对其厚颜无耻的胆量和彻底的背叛感到震惊。我丈夫的哥哥是在妻子在英国度假时与她相识的。在一段足以拍进理查德·柯蒂斯电影的浪漫邂逅中,她参加了一个游览,而他是她的向导——这就是命运。能出什么错呢?她来自瑞典,但
他们让这段关系走通了。她飞去见他,他飞去见她,直到最后她搬到英国,两人在 2019. 年结婚。据我姐夫说,她几年前曾在斯德哥尔摩的一家银行工作过 18 个月,因此他认为她的理财能力与高盛的高管一样出色。当她到达伦敦时,她在一家连锁餐厅找到了一份会计工作,提供了一份宝贵的第二收入,增强了我姐夫的经济能力。虽然他并不穷困,但他的年收入最高也就 £20,000,此外还加上他从父亲继承的一栋度假小屋的租金收入。他利用母亲传给他的钱,全款买了一套价值 £500,000 的房子,其余的钱则作为一种养老金存了起来。他生活俭朴,为晚年存了一笔积蓄,但仍需要第二份收入来覆盖两个人的开支。在
2019 年末,我丈夫的祖父去世,给向他及其哥哥留了另一笔大额资金。两人都被建议出于税务原因将部分资金交给妻子,存入个人储蓄账户 (Isas) 和储蓄账户中。这并不是让我们随心所欲支配的“我们的”钱——而是为了资助我们与丈夫共同的未来。几个月后,我的嫂子辞职了,不久后新冠疫情爆发。就在那时,奇怪的视频开始出现了。她将这些视频发布为 Instagram 故事,揭晓了一项新的商业
她设立了一个名为“创始人生活教练” (Life Coaching for Founders) 的账号。考虑到她既不是生活教练,也从未创办过任何公司,这个组合令人费解,但这仅仅是冰山一角。当我滚动浏览这些视频时,我被深深吸引了。我观看了一段又一段视频,它们开始又结束,却没说到任何重点。她围绕着“心灵的力量”打转,多次用现在时态提到史蒂夫·乔布斯,并说着一些掺杂了 Instagram 式陈词滥调的、花俏的词语堆砌。这很快成了我在互联网上最喜欢的节目。我的亲友们和我一起收看,准备好爆米花,试图理清她到底想表达什么。这些视频就像无法解开的谜题,我们挠头苦思,试图拼凑出其中的信息。她在办公室里布置了一个工作室,在那里她对着虚无地讲述数小时她对成为创始人的热爱,向她的 200 名粉丝提供混乱的人生建议。为了配合社交媒体,她制作了一个看起来像是 1998 年的网站。网站上充斥着剪贴画图形和模糊的任务陈述,背景是令人触目惊心的黄色和紫色。有时会列出产品价格,有时则笼罩在迷雾之中;想要弄清楚与她进行一小时一对一沟通的金钱价值简直令人困惑。她制作了一些在线课程,这些课程通常有购买选项,但定价往往高得离谱且精确得诡异,例如 30 天的“指导”售价 £3,847.93。她参加各类大会和研讨会——“如何在线销售课程”、“数字营销入门”、“现在就扩大你的受众!”——并将这些全部发布在 Instagram 上,作为她“企业家”生活的证明。我对她的行为感到困惑,于是谷歌搜索了其中一门课程,发现其费用高达令人心惊的 £5,000。她甚至留下了一篇评价:“对我来说还没起作用,但我知道它一定会起作用的!”随着事情的发展,我的丈夫和我陷入了困惑。她难道不需要工作吗?这不可能赚钱吧?谁在为这些课程买单?但我们得出结论,这其中一定有我们不了解的某种关键环节。现在,在厨房里,我们意识到我们并没有错过任何信息——错过的是他的兄弟。当然,他会对她六年没赚钱而感到沮丧,但他信任她的动力。是的,他知道她参加了几门课程,但费用能有多高?他认为她擅长理财——毕竟她在银行工作过 18 个月。不知为何,他认为他给她的钱产生的利息足以覆盖这些费用。他绝想不到,她已被卷入一个在线漩涡,并被一种困扰数百万人的现代病所击中:即认为无论技能或能力如何,我们所有人都能成为企业家。在 Instagram “商业网红” (bizfluencers) 的时代,显然你只需要努力、坚持、购买他们的课程(以及使用别人的钱)。她变得像个赌徒,在亏损的投入中继续追加筹码。每当一门课程未能改善她的业务,她就转向下一门,坚信那门课程是她通往百万富翁之路的阶梯——在投入 £54,000 之前,她从未询问过周围任何人,她的商业计划、冗长的意识形态或诡异的网站是否合理。我的姐夫在要求拿回钱以偿还其出租小屋的抵押贷款时,发现了她的财务不忠。她陷入沉默,随后低声说钱“没了”。他僵在原地,惊恐万分,世界在他周围崩塌,他试图清点所有导致这个结果的谎言。经过数年的心理辅导并试图维持婚姻,这件事成了压死骆驼的最后一根稻草。离婚程序迅速启动,她同意从结算款中扣除她花费的钱,尽管她依然不认为自己有错,坚信这一切都是一次
是一项值得的投资。后来,当我问我姐夫她离婚后的计划是什么时,他认真地回答道,完全没有讽刺的意思:“她要回大学读书。”我假设离婚协议涵盖了这笔费用。作者选择匿名
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Monday July 27 2026 | the times 生活 咨询 Tanya Byron 教授:我与受创伤儿童共事,导致我情绪枯竭并陷入高度警觉状态
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我已经从事照顾弱势和受虐儿童的工作近 14 年了,其中大多数孩子经历过暴力、严重虐待、忽视和剥削。 我热爱我的工作,并且依然坚信我们所做事情的意义,但我担心这给我也带来了什么影响。 孩子们告诉我一些大多数人无法想象的事情。我将那些希望能忘记的画面和故事带回家。我没有与丈夫讨论细节,因为我不希望给他增加负担,但我变得更加焦虑,对他人的猜疑也增加了。 如果我的青春期女儿回家晚了哪怕只有十分钟,我的脑海中就会跳出最糟糕的情况。我睡眠质量差,有时会在梦见曾经共事过的孩子后惊醒。我正在失去我的心理韧性,已经陷入了情绪枯竭,但我依然深切地关心他们。 写下这些我觉得有些自私,因为所有这些可怕的事情都没有发生在我身上。我们过去经常有定期的督导,但由于需求增加,这种情况现在变得越来越少。我不想离开这个行业,但我也不想变成一个仅通过创伤视角来看待世界的人。 雅斯敏 (Yasmin)
与受创伤儿童共事几乎不像任何其他职业。 每天,你被要求倾听大多数人都不愿想象的经历:性虐待、肢体暴力、情感虐待、忽视、剥削。你这样做并非作为一个旁观者,而是通过进入孩子的世界来理解发生了什么,帮助他们开始处理这些经历并保护他们。这是一项在情感和认知上要求极高的工作:你必须时刻掌控风险,做出复杂的
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决策并调节您的 情绪反应,同时帮助 孩子调节他们的情绪。这 会产生后果。
您所描述的并非 韧性的缺失。您正遭受 替代性创伤(vicarious trauma),这是 长期接触创伤所导致的 心理后果,常见于那些 反复见证创伤细节现实的 专业人士。 研究强调,这可能导致 从业者内心世界的 转变,使其在安全、信任、 掌控感和人性方面的 信念发生改变。
尽管没有直接接触过创伤事件,一些专业人士仍会出现与创伤后应激障碍(PTSD)非常相似的症状。这被称为继发性创伤压力(secondary traumatic stress),其表现为侵入性意象、噩梦、生理唤醒和回避行为频繁出现。
您提到自己“依然深切关怀”,这表明您并非遭受同情疲劳(compassion fatigue),而是您处理这种同情心所带来的情绪影响的能力正变得超负荷。任何神经系统在重新校准对世界的预期之前,所能吸收的恐惧、悲伤和残酷程度都是有限的。
创伤工作的悖论之一是,专业人士往往擅长帮助除自己以外的每个人。您帮助孩子们将压倒性的创伤转化为连贯的叙事,使他们的大脑将其存储为“已经发生的事”,而不是“感觉仍在发生的事”。创伤专业人士同样需要这样的机会。
有些经历在情感上过于剧烈,无法独自处理,只有在另一个心智帮助我们理解创伤时,思考才成为可能——这就是“心理包容”(psychological containment)。您包容并保护、支持那些儿童和青少年,因此您同样必须获得这种包容:高质量的反思性督导是一项至关重要的临床保障。
目标并非试图在情感上保持距离,而是实现“情感灵活性”:能够包容另一个人的痛苦,然后有意识地从中抽离。许多创伤临床医生在一天结束时会建立一些小的过渡仪式,例如,在进车前走一段路,在开车回家时听播放列表,或者花几分钟专注于呼吸。这些行为向大脑发送重复信号,告知威胁监测期已结束,可以安全地回归日常生活。
当您发现自己的思维在将情况“灾难化”时,同样的原则也适用。如果您的女儿回家晚了,请深呼吸几次(呼气时间总是比吸气时间长),并意识到这是由于您的神经系统多年来一直致力于保护弱小儿童而产生的反应。然后保持好奇心:您的女儿之前迟到过多少次?您有哪些证据证明发生了可怕的事情?这并不是要压抑焦虑,而是帮助大脑的思考部分重新恢复运作。
最后,还有一个比替代性创伤受关注程度低得多的概念:替代性韧性(vicarious resilience)。专业人士不仅因为见证残酷而改变,也因为见证非凡的勇气、生存和康复而改变。您接触的孩子并非仅由发生在他们身上的不幸来定义。
多年来我共事过的许多儿童和青少年,尽管经历了一些足以击垮大多数成年人的事情,但他们展现出了令人惊讶的决心和希望。在共事二十多年后,我仍与其中一些人保持联系,并且
如果您希望获得 Tanya Byron 教授的帮助,请发送邮件至 proftanyabyron@ thetimes.co.uk
庆祝他们的生命,以及他们建立的关系和家庭。我坚守这些故事,并非因为我持有天真的乐观,而是为了让我对人类的认知保持准确,而不是被我们工作的偏见所扭曲。应对替代性创伤(vicarious trauma)的责任不应仅由个体专业人员承担,同样应由那些要求人们从事情感高危工作的组织承担。正如我们绝不能在没有适当保护的情况下让某人反复暴露在物理危险中一样,我们也不应在缺乏相关文化的情况下,让专业人员反复面对心理创伤;在这种文化中,承认情感影响应被视为专业精神的体现,而非软弱的表现。遗憾的是,在那些被拉伸至崩溃边缘的服务体系中,现实往往并非如此。请优先考虑高质量的反思性督导或个人心理治疗,这样你面对的困难案例才能被思考,而不仅仅是被承载。或许可以利用员工援助计划。同时,请咨询你的全科医生 (GP)。睡眠至关重要,因为这是大脑处理情感记忆的时刻。建立平静的夜晚和睡眠习惯,并利用正念、放松和运动来安抚你的神经系统。留意你的“威胁系统”何时跟随你回家:如果你发现自己在陷入灾难化思考,请轻轻地提醒自己,经过多年的保护工作,你的大脑已经变得高度敏感,然后有意识地将注意力带回到眼前的证据上。最后,重新平衡你的工作所塑造的人类图景。与让你感到安全的人共度时光,寻求善良、幽默和家庭生活的体验,记住那些康复、欢笑并茁壮成长的孩子,而不仅仅是那些遭受苦难的孩子。其目的是恢复视角,让你的同情心保持可持续性,而不是变得难以承受。祝好。
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Brian Woulfe
“每一个在过去六个月没见过我的人,问我最频繁的问题都是:我是否在用 Ozempic(减肥药)?”室内设计师 Brian Woulfe 说道,他今年减轻了 13kg。“当人们做出这种假设时,我感到很愤怒。我付出了这么多努力才自己达成的。”现年 43 岁、体重 66kg 的 Woulfe 去年开始学习马球,这改变了他的体格——以及他的生活。“我会把马球描述为我的中年危机,”他说。“有些人会去买跑车或搞外遇,而我决定买马。” 17 年来,他一直在打造其屡获殊荣的设计工作室 Designed by Woulfe。“工作曾是我的全部生活。它决定了我的假期,决定了我的社交活动。一周七天,毫无界限。”他补充道:“我从未觉得过重或极其不健康,但同样地,我也意识到自己的身材并不精干,无法在海滩上自信展露,当然也没有我二十多岁和三十出头时的那种体型。” 那么,一个四十多岁、时间匮乏的创始人兼董事,当他需要一项能帮他放松并让他穿上 Speedos 泳裤看起来很棒的消遣时,该怎么做?Woulfe 在爱尔兰西海岸的一个农场长大,从小就骑马并参加过一些障碍赛,因此当朋友建议从事马术运动时,尽管他已经 25 年没骑马了,但这比打高尔夫更有意义。当他开始这项新运动后,“偶尔尝试”这个念头很快就被抛在脑后。他接任了自己的球队 House of Woulfe 的队长,并赢得了各项赛事和奖杯,包括 Candilio 杯和春季业余锦标赛。“我对马球马的追求就像对待我的事业一样专注。我是一个勤奋的人。我认为当我做某件事时,我想尽最大能力把它做好,”他说。他在 2025 年在一名叫 Antonino Menard 的阿根廷职业选手的指导下,在 Menard Polo 完成了他的第一个赛季(马球赛季通常从 5 月持续到 9 月)。今年,他搬到了温莎大公园的 Guards Polo Club。Guards 是世界上最负盛名的马球俱乐部,查尔斯国王曾在此参加竞技比赛;他曾是
相当于那些 送孩子去 私立学校的 朋友们
现在成为了俱乐部主席。还记得戴安娜穿着那件黑色羊毛衫的著名照片吗?那是在一场卫队马球赛 (Guards polo match) 上拍的。哈里王子曾在卫队比赛,威廉王子则在那里担任过皇家慈善马球杯的队长。这里是顶级名流和贵族的聚集地。 其他与卫队相关的著名马球爱好者包括曾代表英格兰参赛的乔迪·基德 (Jodie Kidd),以及与威廉同在伊顿就读的埃迪·雷德梅恩 (Eddie Redmayne)。海莉·艾特维尔 (Hayley Atwell) 和卢卡·帕斯夸利诺 (Luca Pasqualino) —— 两人在 Disney+ 的吉莉·库珀 (Jilly Cooper) 热播剧《竞争者》(Rivals) 中主演(艾特维尔饰演海伦,鲁珀特·坎贝尔-布莱克的前妻;帕斯夸利诺饰演巴斯·巴丁汉姆)—— 上个月被发现在卡地亚女王杯 (Cartier Queen’s Cup) 现场。 那么,马球是否全像库珀笔下那样充满了派对和连续出轨?“对我来说不是这样。今年我有六个月没喝酒了,”沃尔夫 (Woulfe) 说道。“这项运动中有很多非常有魅力的人,尤其是阿根廷人,他们似乎深受男女双方的喜爱。所以我可以想象,在马球场内外肯定发生过不少风骚时刻。但我无法发表评论。” 沃尔夫本人的生活状态非常惬意:他和伴侣米兰·莱纳特 (Milan Lenart) 以及爱犬巴尼 (Barney) 和波特 (Porter) 往返于伦敦和牛津郡一座翻新完美的旧牧师住宅之间。他们还养了四只侏儒山羊——尼布尔斯 (Nibbles)、诺德尔斯 (Noodles)、布兰布尔 (Bramble) 和比斯基特 (Biscuit),以及各种鸡、几内亚 fowl 和原鸡。 除了关注球,他还必须关注自己的银行余额。他没有透露具体金额,但表示:“我已经接受了一个事实,即我所花费的预算与那些送孩子去私立学校并带他们度假的朋友们相当。”那么,这比 Ozempic 昂贵多了。 他列举了几项有志于成为球员的人可能需要考虑的账单。“你可以按赛季每月 £1,800 租赁一匹马,或者花 £5,000 买一匹马球马。你可以花 £30,000 买到一匹优秀的马球马,但要买到一匹惊人的马球马则需要六位数。”他决定购买,并拥有了 Sexy Bebe、Garua 和 Charrua,但在需要时会租用额外的马。然后你需要一个人类团队。“我的团队中有一名常驻的马球专业球员。此外,我有一名马球经理负责照顾我的马匹。他为我安排团队,安排马匹前往比赛现场,确保它们看过兽医、修过蹄子、每天进行锻炼,并确保马具一切正常。他为每件事都准备了电子表格,这非常契合我的性格。”虽然成本很高,但收益同样丰厚。马球带来的体能状态是完全不同级别的。“刚开始时,我的身体灵活度就像一把花园折叠椅。我连脚趾都摸不到。我现在每周进行三次力量训练。大多数周六和周日我会通过动感单车进行心肺训练。我通过改良版普拉提训练核心。除此之外,我每周还要打三到四次马球。我觉得自己比去年年轻了五岁,甚至十岁。”他继续道:“我的身体完全不同了,从握力、核心力量,到大腿、腰椎和肩膀的力量。我的体态改变了,变得更加挺拔。我现在能摸到地板了。”但回到大腿的话题——强壮的大腿是马球卓越表现的关键吗?“是的。你必须能够夹紧并保持在半坐姿状态。你不是坐下去,而是不断用大腿内侧夹住,身体悬在马鞍之外。”他的健康和体能无疑达到了顶峰,但工作与生活的平衡依然失调。现在他正抵达
凌晨5点就到办公室,这样他就能早点离开去训练。“我的伴侣开玩笑说他成了‘马球寡妇’。现在的马儿得到的关注比他多,”伍尔夫 (Woulfe) 说道,“他会说我现在的外貌比我们刚认识时要好。”伍尔夫的体形变化还伴随着一套全新的衣橱,就像九十年代浪漫喜剧中从“书呆子”到“时髦人士”的大改造。“我的领口尺寸小了两号,所以我不得不买新的正装衬衫和新西装外套。我的所有裤子都收腰了。现在我对超小号 T 恤情有独钟。在皇家马球俱乐部 (Guards Polo Club) 有一家叫 La Martina 的精品店。在那里工作的可爱的贝基 (Becky) 经常拿我开玩笑。大多数马球运动员穿的衣服会稍微宽松一些,这样在打马球时活动更方便。而我则是:‘不,不,不——要更小,更小,更小。’我得让人们看到我的手臂。我这么努力健身,不能让它们都被遮起来。”
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大卫·伯恩 (David Byrne) 前来救场
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Latitude 2026 萨福克郡,亨纳姆公园 (Henham Park, Suffolk) {{{((
在刚刚过去的周末,Latitude 音乐节庆祝其 20 周年纪念。尽管音乐阵容显得异常冷淡,但活动期间正值热浪袭来。该音乐节于 2006 年启动,一直以来都面向年龄较大、财力更雄厚的狂欢者,他们对前沿音乐的兴趣不如对喜剧、戏剧和高端美食摊位等广泛内容的兴趣大。今年散布在亨纳姆公园如诗如画的林地现场的定制生日标识中,有一群染成红色的羊群——这是来自 Ami Cadillac 的一件活体艺术品——以及一场令人眼花缭乱的无人机表演,在夜空中绘制出色彩斑斓的图景,最后拼写出 Latitude 的名称。
周五晚上属于领衔艺人大卫·伯恩 (David Byrne)。考虑到这位 74 岁的前卫流行偶像的现场盛演已成为多么抢手的热门门票,这次邀请堪称一次重大胜利。事实上,笔者在二月份曾给该巡演的欧洲首演评以五星好评。虽然这个露天版本与室内版本相比略有调整,在某些地方感觉力度稍显不足,但伯恩的视听艺术派对盛宴依然极具雄心、富有创造力且令人愉悦。不可避免地,Talking Heads 的经典曲目,包括 《Psycho Killer》、《Once in a Lifetime》和 《Burning Down》等均在演出中出现。
皇家北方交响乐团 (Royal Northern Sinfonia) Glasshouse, Gateshead {{{((
《House》引发了最强烈的反应,观众群变成了一个巨大的大合唱团。 在经历了由拜恩 (Byrne) 带来的早期高潮后,这个周末变成了一场令人沮丧的 procession,充斥着平庸的街头艺人水平的才艺、游轮上的情歌歌手以及主打轻音乐的怀旧艺人。公平地说,Latitude 音乐节一直以来都是一个音乐风格较为温和的节日,但今年的阵容在前卫、新鲜或非主流艺人方面显得尤为匮乏。虽然周六主舞台的压轴嘉宾 Teddy Swims 带来了许多充满激情的宣叙和大乐队的自信风格,但他的这种点唱机式美式乡村风 (Americana) 最终感觉像是一次安全且经过计算的复古摇滚与灵魂乐拼贴练习。 至少第二舞台出现了一些令人愉快的怪异选择,包括来自曼彻斯特的年轻四人组 Westside Cowboy,他们在迷人且粗粝的独立摇滚中加入了悦耳的乡村民谣人声和谐音。苏格兰怪才 Beta Band 乐队也带来了一小时讨喜的、凌乱的迷幻律动 (stoner grooves),而 Wet Leg 则凭借其激昂的朋克流行碰撞和俏皮的歌词,证明了自己是可靠的宠儿。 在喜剧舞台上,伦尼·亨利 (Lenny Henry) 表演了其回归巡演《Still at Large》的精简版。观众对亨利的好感显而易见,尽管他对中年、名声和家庭的温和沉思所获得的礼貌笑声多于捧腹大笑。即便如此,他对该音乐节过度白人化的观察十分敏锐,而他对个人英雄(包括詹姆斯·布朗 (James Brown) 和汤米·库珀 (Tommy Cooper))的精准模仿则充满了温暖的人情味。 就像 Latitude 音乐节本身一样,这是一场平淡的表演,令人愉悦地放松,但缺乏冲击力。
THOMAS JACKSON
促型音乐会 (Proms) 每年在英格兰东北部的探索,最讨人喜欢的一点就是它不仅仅是在该地区举办的节日,而且它在很大程度上也属于该地区。今年的活动包括三个场地(盖茨黑德、桑德兰和米德尔斯堡)以及一批来自东北部的表演者,包括来自 Knats 的爵士乐、皇家北方交响乐团的管弦乐演出,以及两支当地合唱团——RNS 合唱团和 Voices of the River’s Edge,它们与 BBC 歌手团共同演唱,全部由索菲·让宁 (Sofi Jeannin) 指挥,这是她作为 BBC 歌手团首席指挥的最后一次演出。 在杰西·吉拉姆 (Jess Gillam) 奔放且狂想的萨克斯风独奏伴奏下,他们在盖茨黑德 Glasshouse 巨大的大厅中表现出色,人声与萨克斯交融并扩展到巨大的声学空间中,呈现出半神秘的美感。不幸的是,同样的场景对于另一位东北部之星纳丁·莎 (Nadine Shah) 来说效果并不理想,她在周五晚上与 RNS 在大厅内演出。 与合唱团不同,莎的演出使用了扩音设备,在由诺曼·福斯特 (Norman Foster) 设计的空间的巨大声学环境下回荡,这种方式
大卫·拜恩 (David Byrne) 极具创意且充满喜悦的表演是 Latitude 的亮点
纳丁·莎在舞台上极具磁场
削弱了声音的锐度。莎在舞台上极具磁场,她充满活力且富有表现力的声音依然能够以热情的强度穿透其中,即使歌词在回声中迷失,情感依然赤裸地展现在表面,无论是在《Fool》的阴郁愤怒中,还是在《Out the Way》的政治能量中,亦或是对……的沉思致敬。
她在《祈祷垫》(Prayer Mat)中缅怀已故母亲。然而,来自皇家音乐学院(RNS)的演奏者在她的陪伴下能发挥的作用极其有限。他们在《我想要的一切》(All I Want)的闪烁感和《度假地》(Holiday Destination)的伪甜美中点缀了一些色彩,但很少能为原曲的犀利感增加多少分量。在《最强舞者》(Greatest Dancer)的高潮能量中,他们简直就像在看戏。
周末最古怪、最前卫的事情发生在玻璃屋(Glasshouse)的小礼堂里,三位来自 RNS 的音乐家带来了莫顿·费尔德曼(Morton Feldman)的《残缺的对称》(Crippled Symmetry)在逍遥之夏音乐节(Proms)上的首次演出。费尔德曼用重复的片段构建这部作品,且未向表演者指示何时或是否应共同演奏,使得三条音乐线在作品 90 分钟的跨度中始终处于时而一致、时而错位的漂移状态。
这或许是革命性的,又或许是费尔德曼在对观众开一个漫长的玩笑。尽管如此,你必须佩服海伦娜·古德(Helena Gourd,长笛)、朱德·卡尔顿(Jude Carlton,打击乐)和迪尼斯·索萨(Dinis Sousa,键盘手)的敬业精神,因为他们在这部作品中闪烁、徘徊并升华,而这部作品往往在令人入迷的同时也令人沮丧。 西蒙·汤普森 (Simon Thompson) 于 BBC Sounds
伦敦交响乐团/ 威尔逊 伦敦,皇家阿尔伯特礼堂 {{{{{
有些 Proms 音乐会会让你震撼,让你在声音的旋涡中陷入狂喜。我承认,对于约翰·威尔逊(John Wilson)决定将奥托里诺·雷斯皮吉(Ottorino Respighi)三部宏大的罗马管弦乐描绘作品——《节日》、《喷泉》和《松树》——在一小时内连续指挥的决定,我曾持有保留意见,即便他拥有 120 位来自其领导的伦敦交响乐团的超级乐手,能为这些万花筒般的音景注入电影般的生动感。毕竟,谁能连续应对三盘配料丰厚的大份意面而不过量?事实证明,并没有出现“消化不良”——只有对雷斯皮吉那些超浪漫主义、有时甚至嘈杂的管弦乐编曲之大胆感到惊叹,其程度甚至超过了里姆斯基-科萨科夫和理查德·斯特劳斯。此外,他还能巧妙地唤起各种意象:从在贾尼库鲁山(Janiculum Hill)鸣叫的夜莺(公平地说,作曲家指定使用真鸟的录音),到在贝尔尼尼的特里同喷泉(Triton Fountain)中嬉戏的神话宁芙,再到基督徒面对尼禄的狮子时唱起的一首决绝(尽管不无时代错乱之感)的格列高利圣咏,以及一支伤痕累累的帝国军队凯旋而归的壮丽景象。
当我们到达《亚皮亚大道》(Via Appia)的终曲时,我认为音乐不可能再大声或更喧闹了。但随后,一支额外的铜管乐兵团突然出现在管弦乐团上方,短时间内似乎连强大的管风琴都被淹没了。当然,实际上并没有。威尔逊其实应该尝试完全的查尔顿·赫斯顿(Charlton Heston)造型,穿着束腰外衣和凉鞋,头顶挥舞着利剑,来指挥这次巨大的挥霍。但个人张扬并非他的风格。事实上,这位指挥官一个不协调但迷人的特质在于,他无需像现代的伦纳德·伯恩斯坦(Leonard Bernstein)那样挥舞双臂,就能实现灵活、精准和精湛的奇迹。他给予选定的乐手恰好所需的引导,不多一分,而乐手们从始至终以神奇的瞬间予以回应。挑选其中一个独奏是不公平的,但在《松树》的地下墓穴乐章中,从看台上演奏的场外小号简直令人入迷。
在此之前,对比之强烈。威廉·沃尔顿(William Walton)在 20 世纪 50 年代居住在意大利期间创作了他的《大提琴协奏曲》,但与雷斯皮吉的联系到此为止。这部协奏曲是英国式忧郁、惆怅、遗憾和克制的精髓,偶尔被管弦乐的愤怒闪光点所灼伤。乔纳森·阿斯高(Jonathan Aasgaard)在演奏时没有夸张或戏剧化的表演,而是展现出启迪性的细腻和精湛的技术,尤其是在那些类似于华彩段落的部分,无伴奏大提琴的碎片化乐句悬在空中,犹如脆弱的银丝。值得注意的是,在协奏曲结束后,
随后,Aasgaard 在 Respighi 的作品中领奏大提琴组。显然,他不想错过这次乐趣。Richard Morrison 在 BBC Sounds 和 iPlayer 上
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甘地 —— 菲利普·格拉斯和我
一场关于一个试图与一位著名作曲家合作演出的两小时独白,听起来似乎并不怎么吸引人。但当费利姆·麦克德莫特 (Phelim McDermott) 七年前在曼彻斯特国际节日首演他的《玻璃之道》(Tao of Glass) 时,观众和评论家都被迷住了。“一次对艺术创作之谜的探索,既极其有趣又深情动人,”我在《泰晤士报》中如此写道。
自那时起,62 岁的麦克德莫特——他在 30 年前共同创立了 Improbable 剧团——在全球各地演出《玻璃之道》。现在,这部剧来到了西区。那么,现在正是麦克德莫特以他那独树一帜的离题风格,向人们解释他如何以及为何构思这场演出的好时机。
这一切都始于标题中的“玻璃” (Glass)。这指的是菲利普·格拉斯 (Philip Glass),这位 89 岁的美国作曲家实际上出席了曼彻斯特的首演(由于他目前的年龄,飞行旅行较为困难)。麦克德莫特曾在伦敦和纽约执导过几部格拉斯的歌剧,但他与这位作曲家音乐的联系可以追溯到他的学生时代。
“我在当时的米德尔塞克斯综合学院 (Middlesex Poly) 攻读表演艺术学士学位,”他说。“在最后一年,我们根据一个伊恩·麦克尤恩 (Ian McEwan) 的故事创作了一场名为《橱柜之人》(Cupboard Man) 的演出,我们使用了菲利普·格拉斯的专辑《玻璃作品》(Glassworks) 中的音乐。结果,我们将这部剧带到了爱丁堡边缘艺术节,皮埃尔·奥迪 (Pierre Audi) 在那里看到了它,并将其引入了阿尔梅达剧院 (Almeida)。所以,我在伦敦的第一次专业演出就与菲利普的音乐联系在一起了。”
那是在 1985 年,同年英国国家歌剧院 (English National Opera) 在英国首演了格拉斯的《阿肯那顿》(Akhnaten)。年轻的麦克德莫特去看了这部剧。“那是大卫·弗里曼 (David Freeman) 的旧版制作,那个舞台上铺满了沙子的版本,”他说。“有趣的是,多年后当我执导 [格拉斯的] 《真理坚持》(Satyagraha) 并在英国国家歌剧院演出时,他们说:‘你不会又要用沙子吧?我们花了 15 年才把舞台下面的沙子全部清理干净。’”
那部 2007 年制作的《真理坚持》——格拉斯关于甘地生活的歌剧——是麦克德莫特与这位作曲家的第一次直接接触。这种奇幻且充满想象力的舞台呈现已被多次复排。“实际上,当我最初被英国国家歌剧院接触时,他们说:‘你想做格拉斯的……”
职业生涯中 当某件事 崩溃时 另一件事 便会发生
“《海滩上的爱因斯坦》?”他回忆道。“我说:‘绝不可能。你没法演出那个。它太离谱了,就像一场奇怪的狂热之梦。’但英国国家歌剧院 (ENO) 的约翰·贝里说:‘至少去纽约见见菲利普·格拉斯。’我当然答应了。于是我在曼哈顿市中心敲开了格拉斯的门,他说的第一句话是:‘你为什么想演《海滩上的爱因斯坦》?’我说:‘我不想!’嗯,我们在一家当地咖啡馆聊了一个小时,最后他说:‘你如此真诚地不愿演《海滩上的爱因斯坦》,这反而让我觉得你应该演它。’这真是典型的菲利普·格拉斯式发言。” 悖论在于,20 年后,麦克德莫特终于将为明年在曼彻斯特演出的 ENO 舞台呈现这部史诗般的《爱因斯坦》。他期待着这一挑战。“就像当你读史蒂芬·霍金的那本书时,”他说道,指的是《时间简史》。“大约 15 分钟,你会觉得:‘我想我懂了!’然后你的理解就像梦一样消散。当人们去看《海滩上的爱因斯坦》时,我希望他们能感觉到——哪怕只有一天——他们理解了什么是相对论,什么是量子纠缠,引力场是什么感觉。” 但演出时间仍然长达五个小时,不是吗?“是的,”麦克德莫特说,“但当我们演出《阿肯那顿》时,有人在演出后走过来对我说:‘我希望它能更长一些。’” 而麦克德莫特在排演《真理之握》(Satyagraha) 时了解到,格拉斯唯一的要求就是他的歌剧不能被删减。“菲利普说:‘你怎么处理它我不在乎,但你必须完整地演出。’我想是因为之前有一个著名的例子,某 CD 版本将这部歌剧删减了 20 分钟。制片人显然认为,这是格拉斯的作品,音乐一直在重复,删掉一点也没人会注意到。甚至当我们将《真理之握》带到纽约大都会歌剧院时,彼得·格尔布 [大都会歌剧院负责人] 走到我面前说:‘能不能稍微缩短一点?’我猜是因为加班费。我说:‘不,彼得,那简直是菲利普唯一坚持的要求。’所以我们完整地演出了。’”
麦克德莫特在 Improbable 剧团发展出的剧场风格——通过即兴创作来制作演出——证明了在格拉斯漫长的重复和弦序列中维持视觉吸引力的完美方法。“我们一直使用材料和木偶进行即兴创作,”麦克德莫特说,“尽管在过去,人们会说:‘不要在海报上放“木偶”这个词,否则没人会来。’而在菲利普的作品中,有这么多需要填补的空间。你看一个场景,心想:‘天哪,这有 18 分钟,我们要怎么填满?’但当你进入排练室开始瞎折腾,把旧报纸粘在一起或做其他尝试时,很快你就会说:‘该死,才 18 分钟,我们要怎么把所有这些想法都塞进去?’” 《格拉斯之道》(Tao of Glass) 以格拉斯和麦克德莫特尝试根据莫里斯·森达克的儿童书制作演出的经历开篇——这个项目在开始前就崩塌了。“这就像我职业生涯中的很多时刻,”麦克德莫特说。“当某件事崩溃时,另一件事便会发生。我告诉菲利普,我有一个梦想,想做一场戏,房间里只有他和我,我们一起创作关于我的痴迷之作:剧场和他的音乐。他问:‘里面会有木偶吗?’我回答:‘当然。’他说:‘好吧,虽然我完全不知道那是怎么回事,但看来我们要一起做一场戏了。’” “就是这样开始的。我们度过了疯狂的一周,我朗读故事,他坐在一个破旧的钢琴前即兴演奏。最后我们得到了大约十二首曲子,他随后将它们为小型乐队编曲。” 演出标题中的“道” (Tao) 是什么意思?“这是一种信念,认为生命和自然中存在一个过程,它在与你交流,”麦克德莫特说。“有时你会觉得自己在对抗它。所以,如果某件事没有发生,那么
正如你计划的那样,你必须问:这里试图发生什么,什么正试图显现?道实际上是邀请一个生成性的展开过程进入你的生活。”所以,这基本上是指顺势而为,而不是与之对抗?“这是关于与那些深层能量保持一致,学习倾听它们,”麦克德莫特说道。“当我还是个孩子的时候,我母亲经常带我去观看皇家莎士比亚剧团那些优秀的演员。我想,有一天我也将在这里导演莎士比亚剧。嗯,那并没有发生。我最终确实在皇家莎士比亚剧团执导了,但那是一部日本动漫改编剧 $[《我的邻居托托罗》]$。所以我认为,‘道’会倾听你的梦想,但随后会让结果与你的预期不完全一致。”
菲利普·格拉斯 与 费利姆·麦克德莫特。 左图:格拉斯之道
10 2026年7月27日 星期一 | the times times2 您的工作日大脑强化训练
的谜题,让您的大脑进行深度锻炼 Samurai 简单版
SAMURAI (武士数独)
填充每个网格,使每一列、每一行以及每个 3x3 宫格都包含数字 1 到 9。 在谜题重叠的部分,行和列不超出其常规长度。
SAKURO
在空格中填入数字 1 到 9,使 每个圆圈中的数字 等于周围四个空格的 总和,且 每种颜色的总计正确。
Sudoku (迷你数独)
SUDOKU
MINI SUDOKU
填充网格,使每一列、 每一行以及每个 3x2 宫格都包含 数字 1 到 6。
周一至周日,请在 thetimes.com 网站 及 Live 应用程序上在线体验迷你数独。
CODEWORD
右侧十字字谜风格网格中的 每个字母都由 1 到 26 的 数字代表。 字母表中的每个字母在 网格中至少出现一次。 利用已提供的字母来推断 其他字母的身份。在主网格 和较小的参考网格中填入字母, 直到字母表中的全部 26 个 字母都被确定。专有名词除外。
KILLER
填充网格,使每一列、每一行以及 每个 3x3 宫格都包含数字 1 到 9. 每个由虚线 连接的单元格组之和必须等于其 左上角的设定目标数字。在每组由 虚线连接的单元格内,数字不能重复。
TRAIN TRACKS
铺设轨道,使火车能从 A 村 行驶到 B 村。数字表示 每一行和每一列中有多少段轨道。 轨道仅包含直线段和曲线段。 轨道不能自我交叉。
Futoshiki (不等式数独) 填充空白方格,使每一行和 每一列仅包含数字 1 到 5 各一次。 方格之间的符号表示 该数字比相邻数字大 (>) 还是小 (<)。
FUTOSHIKI
谜题
第 14-16 页
I
卡罗尔·米德格利 (Carol Midgley) 剧评
《狂喜》(The Rapture) BBC1 {{{{(
在希腊神话中,卡珊德拉是一位能准确预言未来的特洛伊女祭司,但她被诅咒为没有人相信她。在《狂喜》中,青少年贝瑟尼 (Bethany) 似乎陷入了类似的困境,但更糟糕的是,她因为用螺丝刀刺入母亲眼睛将其杀害,而被关在南威尔士的一家封闭式精神病单位里,因此她的话很难被认真对待。
印度·阿玛特菲奥 (India Amarteifio) 饰演的贝瑟尼令人印象深刻,她成功地将一名显而易见的弑母心理病患者的轻蔑傲慢,与一名被附身且具有脆弱感的 17 岁少女结合在一起,她似乎在接收地球信息并能在事情发生前就预知一切。她能够在 A4 纸上画出这些事件,预见恐怖之事的降临(即“狂喜”)。剧集将如何解释这一切?单为了这个结局就值得一看。
该剧的核心是贝瑟尼与其心理学家加布斯·福克斯博士 (Dr Gabs Fox,鲁丝·梅德利 Ruth Madeley 饰) 之间相互较量的关系。福克斯博士本身压力已经很大,因为她在一次导致丈夫丧生的车祸中失去了腰部以下的功能。
患者与心理学家的对峙如今已是陈旧的电视桥段,但这些场景的对话写得非常犀利。当两人陷入精神博弈,贝瑟尼竭尽全力用残酷的嘲讽挑衅她的医生时,该剧达到了最高峰。“我知道你出过车祸,但我不知道你是个残废,”她在第一次见面时轻蔑地说,并给加布斯起绰号叫“轮子”。她盯着轮椅,问道为什么加布斯还要费心化妆,因为“再也没有人会那样看着你了”。心理病患者的行为基本上就像网络上最恶毒的喷子,这难道不有趣吗?同样有趣的是,电视节目如此频繁地借鉴《沉默的羔羊》中的细节。贝瑟尼偷偷将一支圆珠笔塞进兜里(她并不
我们是如何走到这一步的?: 没有世界秩序
Radio 4, 9.30am
特里斯坦·雷德曼 (Tristan Redman) 探讨了后冷战时期的世界秩序。在那时,自由民主以及由美国权力背书的金融体系——即所谓的“基于规则的国际秩序”——占据主导地位。如今情况正在发生变化。上述的雷德曼将与 Channel 4 News 的国际编辑林赛·希尔萨姆 (Lindsey Hilsum) 以及前 BBC 记者艾伦·利特尔 (Allan Little) 一起,回顾冷战后十年间,外国干预问题在卢旺达种族灭绝和波黑战争期间的斯雷布列尼察大屠杀等事件中被反复验证的情况。 克莱尔·伍德沃德 (Clair Woodward)
鲁丝·梅德利 (Ruth Madeley) 饰演心理学家加布里埃尔·福克斯博士 (Dr Gabrielle Fox)
Times Radio 数字端, 网页, 智能音箱, App
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Radio 4 FM: 92.4-94.6 MHz 5.00am 新闻摘要 5.04 Last Word (最后的话) (r) 5.34 航运预报 5.43 今日祷告 5.45 今日农业 6.00 Today (今日节目) 9.00 Across the Red Line (跨越红线) 在日益极化的世界中寻找共识 (1/3) 9.30 Choice How Did We Get Here?: No World Order (选择:我们如何走到今天?:没有世界秩序) 冷战结束后的第一个十年 (1/6) 10.00 Woman’s Hour (女性时间) 11.00 Church Going (走进教堂),与 Giles Fraser 共同探讨 Giles 回到他年轻时担任神职人员的教区 (3/3) 11.45 Confessions of a Performative Male (表演性男性的忏悔) Darren McGarvey 针对男性气质提出尖锐问题 (1/5)
12.04pm You and Yours (你与你) 1.00 The World at One (一点钟的世界) 1.45 Dead Rabbit (死兔子) 英国乡村的一次阴森发现 (6/10) 2.00 The Archers (牧羊人) (r) 2.15 Alone (孤独) 由 Moray Hunter 创作 (3/6) (r) 2.45 Opening Lines (开篇词) (r) 3.00 A Good Read (好书推荐) Lauren Child 和 David McAlmont 讨论他们最喜爱的书籍 (8/9) 3.30 You’re Dead to Me (在我心中你已死去) 以轻松的方式审视图坦卡蒙的父母 (5/13) (r) 4.00 Troubled Town (不安之城) 威根 (Wigan) 周边年轻人的反社会行为 (r) 4.30 The Kitchen Cabinet (厨房内阁) (4/7) (r) 5.00 PM (下午节目) 6.00 Six O’Clock News (六点新闻) 6.30 Just a Minute (仅一分钟) 由 Tony Hawks, Desiree Burch, Cariad Lloyd 和 Julian Clary 主持 (2/6) 7.00 The Archers (牧羊人) Fallon 心存顾虑 7.15 Front Row (前排) 8.00 The Briefing Room (简报室) David Aaronovitch 主持两场关于移民节目中的第一场 (r) 8.30 BBC Inside Science (BBC 科学内幕) 最新的科学研究 (r) 9.00 Across the Red Line (跨越红线) 寻找共识 (1/3) (r) 9.30 How Did We Get Here?: No World Order (我们如何走到今天?:没有世界秩序) (1/6) (r) 10.00 The World Tonight (今夜世界) 10.45 Wild Dark Shore (荒野暗岸) Rowan 说服 Fen 带她去船只残骸处 (6/10) 11.00 Intimacy (亲密) 由 Lena Headey 出演的关于亲密戏协调员的剧集 (1/4) 11.30 A Good Read (好书推荐) (2/9) (r) 12.00 新闻与天气 12.30am Confessions of a Performative Male (表演性男性的忏悔) (1/5) (r) 12.48 航运预报 1.00 接 BBC 全球服务 (BBC World Service)
Radio 4 Extra 仅限数字广播 8.00am Dr Phil’s Bedside Manner (Phil 博士的床边诊疗) 8.30 Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital (伦敦之声:首都黑人音乐百年) 8.45 Small Island (小岛) 9.00 Just a Minute (仅一分钟) 9.30 The Time of My Life (我的人生时光) 9.45 Daily Service (每日礼拜) 10.00 Sounds Natural (自然之声) 10.30 Boy Racers (少年赛车手) 11.00 Rafts (木筏) 11.30 High Table, Lower Orders (高桌与下层) 12.00 Control Group Six (六号控制组) 12.30pm Dad’s Army (爸爸军队) 1.00 Dr Phil’s Bedside Manner (Phil 博士的床边诊疗) 1.30 Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital (伦敦之声:首都黑人音乐百年) 1.45 Small Island (小岛) 2.00 Wordaholics (文字狂) 2.30 A Whole ’Nother Story (另一个故事) 3.00 Gertrude Stein and the Liberation Fruitcake (格特鲁德·斯泰因与解放水果蛋糕) 3.45 The Phoenix and the Carpet (凤凰与地毯) 4.00 Sounds Natural (自然之声) 4.30 Boy Racers (少年赛车手) 5.00 Rafts (木筏) 5.30 High Table, Lower Orders (高桌与下层) 6.00 Control Group Six (六号控制组) 6.30 Dad’s Army (爸爸军队) 7.00 Dr Phil’s Bedside Manner (Phil 博士的床边诊疗) 7.30 Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital (伦敦之声:首都黑人音乐百年) 7.45 Small Island (小岛) 8.00 Wordaholics (文字狂) 8.30 A Whole ’Nother Story (另一个故事) 9.00 Gertrude Stein and the Liberation Fruitcake (格特鲁德·斯泰因与解放水果蛋糕) 9.45 The Phoenix and the Carpet (凤凰与地毯) 10.00 Comedy Club: Just a Minute (喜剧俱乐部:仅一分钟) 10.30 Listen Against (反向聆听) 11.00 Current-ish (时事大概) 11.30 The Museum of Everything (万物博物馆)
Radio 5 Live MW: 693, 909 5.00am Wake Up to Money (金钱觉醒) 6.00 Breakfast (早餐节目) 9.00 Nicky Campbell (尼基·坎贝尔) 11.00 Adrian Chiles (阿德里安·蔡尔斯) 2.00pm Matt Chorley (马特·乔利) 4.00 Drive (通勤时段) 7.00 Glasgow 2026. The Commonwealth Games (2026年格拉斯哥英联邦运动会) 10.00 Sarah Mulkerrins (萨拉·马尔克林斯) 1.00am Dotun Adebayo (多顿·阿德巴约)
(允许持有尖锐物品),这让人想起了莱克特——偷走一支笔并利用金属夹撬开手铐锁,随后制造血洗之灾。幸运的是,到目前为止,《劫后余生》(The Rapture)中还没有发生这种事。
管理盖布斯(Gabs)残疾的身体实际操作细节并未被掩盖。我们看到她在排尿,还在试用一个震动器,她因挫败感而将其扔到房间另一端,使其在地板上颤抖。“我想象不出除了亚历克斯以外有人会触碰我,或者如果他们那样做,我是否能感觉到,”她告诉她的治疗师(露丝·琼斯 饰)。盖布斯初步产生好感的对象是弗雷泽·梅尔维尔(Frasier Melville),这并不乐观,主要因为他由杰克·法辛(Jack Farthing)饰演,而此人通常演的是反派。
同样散发着不祥气息的是贝瑟尼(Bethany)的父亲,伦纳德·克拉尔(Leonard Krall,萨姆·哈泽尔丁 饰)。他给人的感觉像是“邪教头目”,而且显然是个气候变化否认者,他面对教会信众发表着欢快而自负的演说,信众们穿着写有“选择希望”的 T 恤。盖布斯说,这种 T 恤是她用来筛选“蠢货”的“试金石”。很精彩的台词。
总之,贝瑟尼在事件发生前几天画了一幅母亲眼睛被螺丝刀刺穿的画而被定罪,但她声称自己是无辜的。我们拭目以待。我的问题是,如果她能预见到母亲被杀,为什么不能预见到是谁干的?
10.00 Jim White 和 Simon Jordan 1. Hawksbee 和 Jacobs 4.00 talkSPORT Drive 7.00 Kick Off 10.00 The Sports Bar 1.00am Extra Time with Paul Ross
Talk 仅限数字频道 6.00am Jeremy Kyle 10.00 Julia Hartley Brewer 1.00pm Ian Collins 4.00 Kevin O’Sullivan 7.00 Peter Cardwell 10.00 Petrie Hosken 1.00am Paul Ross
6 Music 仅限数字频道 5. Amy Lamé 7.00 Nick Grimshaw 10.00 Jamz Supernova 1.00pm Deb Grant 4.00 Steve Lamacq’s Teatime Session 7.00 New Music Fix Daily 9.00 Riley & Coe 11.00 The First Time With 12.00 Skunk Anansie at the BBC 2. Skunk Anansie Live 3.00 Midnight Meets with Colin Murray 4.00 The Skunk Anansie Playlist
Virgin Radio 仅限数字频道 6.30am Steve Denyer on The Chris Evans Breakfast Show 10.00 Ana Matronic 2.00pm Ben Jones 6.00 Geoff Lloyd 10.00 Goldierocks 2.00am James Merritt
Classic FM FM: 100-102 MHz 6.30am Breakfast with Dan Walker 9.00 The Hall of Fame Hour with Dan Walker 10.00 Aled Jones 1.00pm Anne-Marie Minhall 4.00 Margherita Taylor 7.00 Relaxing Evenings with Zeb Soanes 9.00 Classic FM’s Composer Carousel With Zeb Soanes 10.00 Calm Classics 1.00am Bill Overton 4.00 Early Breakfast
今日推荐
《进化》(Evolution)
BBC2, 晚上 9 点
在他这部关于五种动物进化的引人入胜的系列节目第三集中,克里斯·帕克汉姆 (Chris Packham) 思考:蝙蝠是如何变得如此饥饿的?在帕克汉姆引导我们探索这种动物肠道和颌部的惊人起源及其令人惊叹的回声定位能力(通过声音“观察”周边物体并产生回波的能力)时,这又是另一场高风险的生存游戏。该节目将流畅的视觉效果与科学专业知识相结合,主持人对自然界的的热爱增强了观看体验,最典型的例子就是他对卢卡 (Luca) —— 最后一个通用共同祖先的赞美。这是一种微小的细胞生命形式,在地球早期的极端恶劣条件下幸存了下来,它是万物的源头,将我们所有生物连接在一起:无论体型大小,无论是否多毛,当然,还包括那些“疯狂”的蝙蝠。 —— 班·多威尔 (Ben Dowell)
BBC1 BBC2 ITV1 Channel 4 5 6.00am 早餐节目 (Breakfast) 9.30 动物公园 (Animal Park) (r) (AD) 10.15 追踪、寻找,找回我的车 (Trace, Track, Get My Car Back) (r) 10.45 专家证人 (Expert Witness) (r) 11.15 房屋拍卖 (Homes Under the Hammer) (r) (AD) 12.15pm 讨价还价 (Bargain Hunt) 1.00 1 点 BBC 新闻;天气 1.35 BBC 地区新闻;天气 1.45 1 点 BBC 新闻;天气 2.00 免费之财 (Money for Nothing)。新系列。一名铁匠在制作一组剧院灯光支架时面临其有史以来最大的挑战。 2.45 逃往乡村 (Escape to the Country)。朱尔斯·哈德逊 (Jules Hudson) 与一对追求新生活的运动型夫妇前往坎布里亚郡乡村 (r) 3.45 竞拍室 (The Bidding Room)。苏格兰最著名的知名人物之一浮出水面 4.30 行走拍卖师 (The Travelling Auctioneers)。一次格拉斯哥的断舍离清理出价值不菲的珠宝和冰鞋 (r) (AD) 5.15 无点之赛 (Pointless)。问答节目 (r) 6.00 6 点 BBC 新闻;天气 6.30 BBC 地区新闻;天气
7.00 The One Show 萨曼莎·莫顿 (Samantha Morton)、菲奥娜·布鲁斯 (Fiona Bruce) 和 菲利普·莫尔德 (Philip Mould) 做客
7.30 东区街 (EastEnders) 伊恩在为可能是一次最后的自由日做准备,而乔治则被一个过去的人面面对 (AD)
8.00 全景 (Panorama) 时事报告
8.30 诈骗拦截 (Scam Interceptors) 诈骗者试图诱骗一名女性为他们购买一部顶级手机 (r)
9.00 狂喜 (The Rapture) 加布斯在贝瑟尼的画作中寻找那个神秘女子的踪迹。一篇病毒式传播的文章动摇了她对迪克 (Dick) 的信任,此时她有了一个惊人的发现。一场大规模停电引发了混乱 (2/5) (AD)
10.00 10 点 BBC 新闻
10.30 BBC 地区新闻和天气 10.40 你认为你是谁?(Who Do You Think You Are?) 托比·琼斯 (Toby Jones) 探索其母亲一方一个非凡的演艺世家,并决心查明父亲关于与印度有联系的故事究竟是事实还是虚构 (5/8) (r) (AD)
11.40 电影:《车厢里的女人》(The Lady in the Van) (12, 2015) 讲述作家艾伦·本内特 (Alan Bennett) 与一位古怪的无家可归女性之间友谊的真实故事,他在 1970 年代与她结交,并允许她将破旧的面包车停在他位于卡姆登 (Camden) 的家门外。由玛吉·史密斯 (Maggie Smith) 和 亚历克斯·詹宁斯 (Alex Jennings) 主演的喜剧剧集 (AD)
6.30am 讨价还价 (Bargain Hunt) (r) 7.15 动物公园 (Animal Park) (r) 8.00 手语专区:修理铺 (Sign Zone: The Repair Shop) (r) (AD, SL) 9.00 BBC 新闻 1.00pm 理查德·奥斯曼的游戏屋 (Richard Osman’s House of Games)。亚斯明·阿克拉姆 (Yasmine Akram) 和 卡里亚德·劳埃德 (Cariad Lloyd) 参演 (r) 1.30 终点线 (The Finish Line)。问答竞赛 (r) 2.15 闪电 (Lightning)。由佐伊·莱昂斯 (Zoe Lyons) 主持的问答赛 (r) 2.45 毛毛骑行者的烘焙之旅 (The Hairy Bikers’ Bakeation)。寻找挪威最好的烘焙食品 (r) (AD) 3.45 农民乡村大决战 (The Farmers’ Country Showdown)。一名养猪农和一名养羊农在伊登桥与奥克斯泰德农业展 (Edenbridge & Oxted Agricultural Show) 上竞争 (r) 4.15 太空看地球 (Earth from Space)。在干旱期间跟随一个大象家庭 (r) (AD) 5.15 把它卖了!(Flog It!) 来自格洛斯特大教堂 (r) 6.00 理查德·奥斯曼的游戏屋 (Richard Osman’s House of Games)。凯伦·豪尔 (Karen Hauer)、斯通·亨特利 (Storm Huntley)、乔·马勒 (Joe Marler) 和 汤姆·里德·威尔逊 (Tom Read Wilson) 参加 (r) 6.30 仅此一事 (Just One Thing)。克莱夫·迈里 (Clive Myrie) 前往肯特郡,在那里他遇到一名女性,并向她建议借养一只宠物或许能降低她的血压 (r) (AD)
7.00 全球之眼 (Global Eye) 来自世界各地 BBC 记者的调查报告
7.30 顶尖大脑 (Mastermind) 专业领域包括 Madness 乐队、地质学家詹姆斯·赫顿 (James Hutton)、韦斯·安德森 (Wes Anderson) 的电影以及巴黎地铁的历史
8.00 唯一连接 (Only Connect) 由 维多利亚·科伦·米切尔 (Victoria Coren Mitchell) 主持,Sinistrals 队在首轮对阵 Merseyside Eyes 队
8.30 大学挑战赛 (University Challenge) 牛津大学大学学院对阵剑桥大学圣约翰学院
9.00 进化 (Evolution) 克里斯·帕克汉姆探讨蝙蝠的进化,分析寻找食物的驱动力如何塑造地球上的生命,并催生出自然界最贪婪的食者之一。见今日推荐 (3/5) (AD)
10.00 莫蒂默与怀特豪斯:垂钓之旅 (Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing) 鲍勃和保罗前往湖区 (3/6) (r) (AD)
10.30 新闻之夜 (Newsnight) 由维多利亚·德比雪现场主持的洞察分析与全球采访
11.05 电影:《希望与光荣》(Hope and Glory) (15, 1987) 从一名将战争视为冒险的男孩视角,展现闪电战期间在伦敦的生活。约翰·博曼执导的半自传式剧情片,由塞巴斯蒂安·赖斯-爱德华兹和莎拉·迈尔斯主演。见电影选择 (AD)
12.55am 符号区:乡村生活 (Sign Zone: Countryfile) 安妮塔·拉尼访问埃塞克斯海岸的一个自然保护区 (r) (SL) 1.50 贝日拉克 (Bergerac)。由达米安·莫洛尼主演的犯罪剧现代重构版 (1/6) (r) (AD, SL) 2.35-2.45 生命线 (Lifeline)。艾迪·马森代表图雷特综合征行动组织 (Tourettes Action) 提出这项呼吁 (r) (AD, SL)
通过利用档案片段、照片以及历史学家的贡献,本片旨在“揭示”犹太隔离区在大屠杀中的作用。在德国入侵后,波兰的犹太人被强行迁移到过度拥挤的“露天监狱”贫民区;纳粹并不直接处决他们,而是依靠饥饿和疾病来减少人数。随着希特勒和斯大林在 1941 年中期开战, 进化 (Evolution),BBC2, 9pm
6.00am 英国之晨 (Good Morning Britain) 10.00 早安 (This Morning) 1.30pm ITV 新闻;天气预报 2.00 迪金森的真货 (Dickinson’s Real Deal)。团队前往特尔福德,在那里艾莉森·查普曼决定钻石是她最好的朋友,而斯图尔特·霍夫加特纳则为一块极具冒险精神的口袋表投入巨资 (r) (AD) 3.00 成交或不成交 (Deal or No Deal)。由斯蒂芬·穆尔赫恩主持,一名参赛者尝试按正确顺序打开 22 个红色盒子,与臭名昭著的“银行家”对赌,以赢取足以改变生活的现金大奖 (r) (AD) 4.00 倾斜点 (Tipping Point)。本·舍泼德主持这场以街机为主题的问答赛,参赛者从四个滑道中选择一个投下代币,希望赢取 £10,000 奖金 (r) 5.00 追击 (The Chase)。布拉德利·沃尔什主持,来自切斯特菲尔德、阿尔特林查姆、绍恩德-昂-西和格洛斯特的参赛者将与残酷的“追击者”之一进行智力较量 (r) 6.00 地区新闻;天气预报 6.30 ITV 新闻;天气预报
7.30 弗莱彻家族农场 (Fletchers’ Family Farm) 全家人在自家的林地里度过了一个露营之夜 (7/10) (r) (AD)
8.00 艾默代尔 (Emmerdale) 凯文渴望留下好印象,而史蒂夫在主农场 (Home Farm) 有计划 (AD)
8.30 花街 (Coronation Street) 乔迪的出人意料的到来掩盖了哈珀的欢迎回家派对 (AD)
9.00 黑暗 (The Dark) 莫妮卡试图将家人的安全放在首位,但当凶手身份被揭晓且她有机会救出最后一个受害者时,她立即采取行动 (6/6) (AD)
10.00 ITV 十点新闻;天气预报;随后是地区新闻
10.45 TikTok:病毒式传播的谋杀案 (TikTok: Murder Gone Viral) 探讨美国网红亚历克西斯·沙基 (Alexis Sharkey) 的案件,她的丈夫于 2020 年 11 月宣布她失踪,不久后发现了她的尸体 (3/3) (r) (AD)
11.40 爱与死亡 (Love & Death) 在坎蒂被迫反思她的婚姻后,一种常态感重新回归 (3/7) (r) (AD)
12.40am 电视购物 3.00 阶梯 (The Staircase)。一名女企业家据报道从楼梯上摔下后被发现死亡,警方随即展开调查。基于事实的剧集,由科林·费尔和托妮·科莱特主演 (r) (AD, SL) 4.05 与 ITV 一起放松 5.10-6.00 迪金森的真货 (Dickinson’s Real Deal)。在彼得伯勒 (r) (AD, SL)
犹太隔离区与大屠杀 (The Ghettos and the Holocaust)
PBS America, 9.50pm
6.25am Cheers (r) 7.45 Everybody Loves Raymond (r) (AD) 9.10 Frasier (r) (AD) 11.10 Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares USA (r) 12.05pm Channel 4 新闻摘要 12.10 Find It, Fix It, Flog It (r) (AD) 1.10 The Great House Giveaway. 两名来自内斯 (Neath) 的陌生人购买了一处房产 (r) 2.10 Countdown. 主持人:Scarlett Moffatt 3.00 A Place in the Sun. Jasmine Harman 在西班牙南部寻找房产 (r) 4.00 Narrow Escapes. 在德比郡,一对伙伴通过麦克尔斯菲尔德运河 (Macclesfield Canal) 上的博斯利船闸 (Bosley Locks),前往卡尔登运河周年庆典 (r) (AD) 5.00 Château DIY. 业主们在零下低温中奋斗,试图将一座没有自来水或电力的废弃城堡侧翼改造为可居住空间 (r) (AD) 6.00 American Pickers. 当他们发现世界上最稀有的摩托车之一时,Mike Wolfe 和 Frank Fritz 试图筹集前所未有的资金以达成交易 (r) (AD)
7.00 Channel 4 新闻
8.00 Dover 24/7: 英国最繁忙的港口 风暴艾米 (Storm Amy) 袭击多佛,强风导致一艘邮轮偏离航线。边境管理局发现一辆轮胎中塞满了违禁品的车辆 (AD)
9.00 24 Hours in A&E 在诺丁汉的皇后医疗中心,一名 23 岁的女性发生骑行事故,从马背上摔下且被马压在身下;同时,医生急需确定一名 26 岁的男性是否中风 (AD)
10.00 Secret Lives of Gypsy Wives 蒂娜 (Tina) 因无法负担昂贵的兽医账单而心碎。特鲁利 (Trewley) 仍计划举办万圣节派对,她的网红事业得到了提升。特鲁利受到启发,邀请她的母亲和姐妹们参加一次拍照活动。详见当日精选 (AD)
11.05 999: On the Front Line 急救人员发现一名摔倒的女性,该女性服用血栓药物,可能出现脑出血。一名男性发现难以沟通,且面部右侧下垂 (r)
12.05am Secrets of the Celebrity Sex Tapes (AD) 12.55 The Showjumper Murder (r) (AD, SL) 2.45 电影:《Pooja, Sir》(15, 2024) 由 Asha Magrati 主演的犯罪惊悚片。语言为尼泊尔语、印地语和迈蒂利语 4.30 Sunday Brunch (r) 4.35 Hollyoaks Omnibus (r) (AD, SL) 5.45-6.25 Countdown (r)
在德国占领的苏联领土上,开设了更多犹太隔离区;到 1942 年底,所有隔离区都被纳入了“最终解决方案”,在被驱逐到死亡营之前作为临时收容所。最近出土的日记被用来阐明隔离区生活的方方面面,从社区领导者面临的严峻道德困境,到儿童(他们更容易走私商品或进行非法购买)成为养家糊口者的现象。 John Dugdale
6.00am Milkshake! 9.15 Jeremy Vine 11.30 Storm & Alexis 12.45pm 5 News 午间新闻 12.50 Matt Allwright 2.20 电影:《She Is Not Your Daughter》(12, TVM, 2022) 当 Kathy 的家人受到威胁时,她发现丈夫多年来一直向她隐瞒着一个令人胆寒的秘密。由 Alicia Leigh Willis 主演的惊悚片 (AD) 4.00 Castle. 作者在办理案件期间被击晕,醒后发现自己处于一个从未见过 Beckett 的世界,必须尝试寻找回到自己现实的方法 (r) 4.55 Love Nature. 观察 WWT Caerlaverock 的大循雁迁徙 (r) 5.00 5 News (Dan Walker 主持) 6.00 Jersey and Guernsey. 在泽西岛,一对帆船拍档参加了历史悠久的戈雷赛船节 (Gorey Regatta),但比赛开始后,他们很快发现自己正处于碰撞航线上。该系列最后一集 (r) 6.55 5 News 更新
7.00 Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders 在斯坎索普 (Scunthorpe) 附近,警员们在追踪一辆疑似克隆的宝马车,但司机企图逃跑,在撞上死胡同后试图穿过一片田野逃离 (3/10) (r)
7.55 5 News 更新
8.00 Street Cops: Catching the Yobs 新剧集。回归追踪北安普顿郡警察的纪录片,其中包含一名警员发出紧急求救电话,所有单位竞相赶来保护其同事
9.00 《乌鸦女孩》(The Crow Girl) 一具埋在林地里的尸体将珍妮特引导至功能失调的伯克曼家庭;与此同时,一名客户的去世让索菲亚在与维多利亚的咨询疗程中陷入沉思,而与阿马尔的一次邂逅则让迈克更接近真相。主演 伊芙·迈尔斯 (4/6) (AD)
10.05 2026年英联邦运动会 格拉斯哥第四日的精彩回顾,包括游泳、残疾人游泳、举重,以及田径和残疾人田径的首批奖牌赛。
11.05 《警察:夜班 999》(Police: Night Shift 999) 一名警员在 M5 公路巡逻时,发现一名男子在开车时看着手机,随即将其拦截。一名警员接到报案前往当地公园,处理一起公众举报男子注射药物的事件 (8/8) (r)
《龙之家族》 (House of the Dragon)
Sky Atlantic/Now, 9pm
尽管 HBO 对第六集的内容守口如瓶,但网络推测指出,将有一场战斗,由绿党面对戴蒙 (Daemon, 马特·史密斯 饰) 率领的黑党军队。除此之外,我们可以相当确信奥蒙德 (Ormund, 詹姆斯·诺顿 饰) 将再次进行圆滑的阴谋策划,雷妮拉 (Rhaenyra, 艾玛·达西 饰) 将继续发现成为女王并非想象中那么美好,而艾莉森 (Alicent, 奥利维亚·库克 饰) 和
7.00pm 大西洋:地球上最狂野的海洋。南大西洋的海豚群和企鹅群 (AD) 8.00 古希腊宝藏。西方文明对希腊艺术的痴迷。该系列最后一集 (AD) 9.00 埃及失落之城。埃及沙漠之下可能存在的建筑 (AD) 10.30 成为弗里达·卡罗。这部纪录片记录了弗里达与迭戈·里维拉在旧金山共处的时光,在那里她的风格引起了轰动,她也决定以自己的能力取得成功 (AD) 11.30 蒙娜丽莎的秘密生活。列奥纳多·达·芬奇的《蒙娜丽莎》之谜 (AD) 12.30am 大西洋:地球上最狂野的海洋。纪录片 (AD) 1.30 古希腊宝藏 (AD) 2.30am-3.30 蒙娜丽莎的秘密生活 (AD)
U&Drama
7.00pm 追击 (The Catch Up) 7.05 致命 60 (Deadly 60)。史蒂夫·巴克沙尔访问巴西雨林 7.30 致命 60 (Deadly 60)。对人类构成威胁的生物 8.00 英国缝纫大赛 (The Great British Sewing Bee)。索菲·威兰欢迎 12 位参赛者进入缝纫室,帕特里克·格兰特和埃斯梅·杨围绕“英国夏天”这一主题设定了三项挑战 (AD) 9.00 英国缝纫大赛 (The Great British Sewing Bee)。三项围绕印花与色彩展开的主题挑战 (AD) 10.00 电影:《爱乐之城》 (La La Land, 12, 2016) 艾玛·斯通和瑞恩·高斯林主演的音乐剧 (AD) 11.55 你本该做的事 (Things You Should Have Done) 12.20am 你本该做的事 (Things You Should Have Done) 1.15 2024 1. BBC 新喜剧奖 1.45am-3.45 小镇大骚乱 (Small Town, Big Riot) (SL)
Variations
BBC1 北爱尔兰 8.30pm-9.00 巴拉的野外回归 (Barra’s Return of the Wild) 10.40 真北:笑点——为了笑而战 (r) 11.10 你认为你是谁? (r) 12.10am 电影:《车中女》 (The Lady in the Van, 2015) 1.50am-6.00 BBC 新闻
BBC1 苏格兰 11.40pm Scotcast (r) 12.10am 电影:《车中女》 (The Lady in the Van, 2015) 1.50am-6.00 BBC 新闻
BBC1 威尔士 8.30pm-9.00 我们的生活:坚石。举石传统
Live
BBC2 北爱尔兰 10.00pm-10.30 Kayak ó Thuaidh (r)
科利斯 (Corlys, 史蒂夫·图森 饰) 将在整集中都处于暴躁状态。JD
吉普赛妻子的秘密生活 (Secret Lives of Gypsy Wives)
Channel 4, 10pm
TikTok 明星 Trewley-Precious 现年 26 岁,住在母亲家花园里的一座亮粉色小木屋中,今晚她回忆起在埃塞克斯郡克拉克顿委员会住房区长大的经历。“在我长大时,”她说,“那里很混乱。比如,有帮派,有持刀袭击。”在本集中,她的网红职业
Sky Arts 6.00am 古乐学院:维瓦尔第《四季》 7.25 绘画之乐 (AD) 9.00 出乎意料的故事 (AD) 10.00 希区柯克呈现 11.00 探索:格里高利·派克 (AD) 12.00 电影 (AD) 1.00pm 出乎意料的故事 (AD) 2.00 希区柯克小时 (黑白) 3.00 七十年代 (AD) 4.00 探索:克劳迪娅·卡迪纳莱 (AD) 5.00 2021 年度肖像艺术家。模特包括凯莉·麦克唐纳 (AD) 6.00 出乎意料的故事 (AD) 7.00 希区柯克呈现 8.00 安德烈·里厄:我心之歌。仲夏夜音乐会 10.30 尚-米歇尔·雅尔塞维利亚现场。一场 2025 年的音乐会 12.30am 打造大师 3.30 艺术内部:曼彻斯特美术馆的德里克·贾曼 4.00 花园艺术 5.00am-6.00 电影 (AD)
6.00am Backyard Builds (SL) 6.30 Deal or No Deal (AD) 7.30 Dress to Impress (AD, SL) 8.25 Olivia and Alex: Parenthood (AD) 9.30 The Only Way Is Essex 10.30 The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City 11.20 The Real Housewives of Orange County 12.15pm Dinner Date (AD) 1.15 Supermarket Sweep 2.15 The Floor USA (AD) 3.10 The Only Way Is Essex 4.10 The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City 5.00 The Real Housewives of Orange County 6.00 Celebrity Catchphrase (AD) 7.00 The Floor USA (AD) 8.00 The 1% Club (AD) 9.00 Love Island. Live finale 10.20 Family Guy (AD) 11.20 American Dad! (AD) 12.20am Bob’s Burgers (AD) 1.15 Plebs (AD, SL) 1.40am-2.35 Deal or No Deal (AD, SL)
BBC Scotland 2.00pm This Farming Life (r) 3.00 Beechgrove Garden (r) 3.30-4.30 Paramedics on Scene (r) 7.00 News 7.30 The Great Food Guys (r) 8.00 The Mountain (r) 9.00 Interior Design Masters with Alan Carr (r) 10.00 River City 10.30 Two Doors Down (r) 11.00 Scotcast 11.30- 12.00 Mrs Brown’s Boys (r)
S4C 6.00am Cyw 12.00 News; Weather 12.05pm Ffasiwn Drefn (r) 12.30 Heno (r) 1.00 Straeon Harri Parri (r) 2.00 News; Weather 2.05 Prynhawn Da 3.00 News; Weather 3.05 Ras Yr Wyddfa (r) 4.00 Awr Fawr 5.00 Stwnsh 6.00 Rhys Patchell: Japan a’r Gic Olaf (r) 6.30 Eigra (r) 6.59 News 7.00 Heno 7.30 News; Weather 8.00 Gemau’r Gymanwlad 2026 10.28 Y Tywydd 10.30-11.35pm Ar Brawf (r)
因一项睫毛合作而获得提升。Helen Stewart
流媒体之选
Furious
Disney+
在这部猫鼠游戏般的惊悚片中,连环杀手兼独行侠 Catherine (Lola Petticrew) 受到 Alice (Emmy Rossum) 的调查,后者是一名 FBI 探员,得到了她的老朋友 Marshall (Jake Lacy) 和 Danny (Scoot McNairy) 的支持。这些女性——
8.55am Heir Hunters 10.00 Four in a Bed 12.40pm Come Dine with Me (AD) 3.20 Four in a Bed 5.50 George Clarke’s Old House, New Home (AD) 6.55 Location, Location, Location 7.55 Grand Designs. Kevin McCloud 跟踪一个将一座低效且毫无灵感的 1950 年代房屋改造为流畅、现代主义杰作的项目 (7/12) (AD) 9.00 Bill Bailey’s Vietnam. Bill 抵达萨帕 (Sa Pa) 周边的山区 (AD) 10.00 24 Hours in A&E. 一名年轻男子 对一种娱乐性药物产生了严重的反应 (AD) 11.05 24 Hours in A&E. 一名 75 岁男子因颈部刺伤接受治疗 (AD) 12.10am 999: On the Front Line. 一名男子在街头心脏骤停 1.15 24 Hours in A&E (AD) 3.25am-3.55 A Place in the Sun
6.00am George and Mildred 7.05 经典 Emmerdale (AD) 8.05 经典 Coronation Street (AD) 9.10 A Touch of Frost (AD) 11.20 Heartbeat (AD) 1.30pm Midsomer Murders (AD) 3.35 经典 Emmerdale (AD) 4.40 经典 Coronation Street (AD) 5.50 Heartbeat。乡村剧 (AD) 8.00 Midsomer Murders。当一具尸体在林地被发现时,一家乡村杂志及其直言不讳的所有者受到了 Barnaby 和 Jones 的审查 (AD) 10.00 Grantchester。当一名嫌疑人被发现死亡时,没有人能证实 Geordie 的行踪 (5/6) (AD) 11.00 Grantchester。Sidney 的老友 Sam Milburn 牧师失踪了 (6/6) (AD) 11.50 Trial & Retribution (2/2) 1.25am-2.25 Wycliffe
8.00am America the Bountiful 8.35 Treasures Decoded 9.35 Pirates: Behind the Legends 10.35 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed 11.50 The Ghettos & The Holocaust 1.00pm America the Bountiful 1.35 Treasures Decoded 2.35 Pirates: Behind the Legends 3.35 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed 4.55 The Ghettos & The Holocaust 6.05 America the Bountiful 6.40 Treasures Decoded 7.40 Pirates: Behind the Legends 8.35 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed。调查黑暗时代的英国真实面貌 9.50 The Ghettos & The Holocaust。 犹太区在大屠杀中扮演的角色。见今日精选 11.00 Pirates: Behind the Legends 12.00 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed 1.15am-2.00 America the Bountiful
表面上截然相反的角色——由截然不同的演员饰演:Rossum 是一位以美国版《无耻之徒》闻名的歌手兼演员;Petticrew 则是近期两部关于“动乱时期”剧集《Say Nothing》和《Trespasses》中充满张力的主演。JD
电影选择
Hope and Glory (15, 1987)
BBC2, 11.05pm
John Boorman 的这部战争剧是对生活的一次带有自传色彩的宽泛演绎
体育
今日
上海大师赛斯诺克直播 TNT Sports 1, 7am-10.30 赛事首日第一轮报道,地点在中国上海卢湾体育馆
The Hundred:Southern Brave 女队 v MI London 女队 Sky Sports Cricket, 2.45pm-6, Sky Sports Main Event, 3pm-6 (开赛时间 3.00)。Utilita Bowl 比赛报道
网球直播 Sky Sports +, 4pm-4am, Sky Sports Tennis, 4pm-2am 华盛顿 DC 赛首日报道
The Hundred:Southern Brave 男队 v MI London 男队 Sky Sports Main Event, Sky Sports Cricket, 6pm-9.30 (开赛时间 6.30)。Utilita Bowl 比赛报道
MLB 直播:德州游骑兵队 v 西雅图水手队 TNT Sports 1, 7.30pm-10.30 (开赛时间 7.35)。Globe Life Field 美国联盟比赛报道
6.00am Fish Town (重播) 8.00 Billions (重播) (AD) 10.10 The White Lotus (重播) (AD) 12.25pm Homicide: Life on the Street (重播) 2.15 Billions (重播) (AD) 4.25 The White Lotus (重播) (AD) 6.45 The Gilded Age。Agnes 和 Ada 对 Peggy 恶化的病情感到担忧 (2/8) (重播) (AD) 7.55 The Gilded Age。谈判开始破裂 (3/8) (重播) (AD) 9.00 House of the Dragon。由 Matt Smith 主演的《权力的游戏》前传。见今日精选 (重播) 10.20 The Last of Us。Ellie 遇到了一群心怀仇恨的幸存者 (8/9) (重播) (AD) 11.25 Dune: Prophecy。由 Emily Watson 主演的科幻前传 (重播) (AD) 12.45am The White Lotus (重播) (AD) 2.00 Gomorrah: The Origins。 新剧集。由 Luca Lubrano 主演的犯罪剧前传。意大利语 4.10am-6.00 Urban Secrets (重播)
6.30am 电影:Account Rendered (PG, 1957) (黑白) 7.45 电影:The Breaking Point (U, 1961) (黑白) 8.55 电影:Do You Know This Voice? (PG, 1964) (黑白) 10.30 Z Cars 11.30 Star Performance: The Deceiving Eye (黑白) 12.00 Railway Murders 1.00pm Richard the Lionheart (黑白) 1.30 电影:The Spaniard’s Curse (U, 1958) (黑白) 3.00 Look at Life 3.15 电影: Assignment K (U, 1968) 5.10 Cinebox Memories 5.15 电影:The Arsenal Stadium Mystery (U, 1939) 由 Leslie Banks 主演的惊悚片 (黑白) 7.00 The Footage Detectives 8.00 Maigret. A murder in a family 9.50 电影:Lost Command (15, 1966) Anthony Quinn 主演的剧情片 12.25am The Lawless Years (黑白) 12.55 电影:Murder in Maussane (15, TVM, 2017) 2.55-4.25 电影: The Devil’s Hand (PG, 1961) (黑白)
ITV4 6.00am The Best of the 80s 6.15 Magnum, PI 8.20 Dempsey and Makepeace (AD) 9.25 Boon 10.30 The Champions 11.35 Robin of Sherwood 12.45pm Magnum, PI 2.50 Dempsey and Makepeace (AD) 3.50 Boon 4.55 The Champions 6.00 Formula E. 东京街道赛道 (Tokyo Street Circuit) 东京 ePrix 第二场赛事的完整延时报道 8.35 The Motorbike Show. Henry Cole 参加复古摩托车俱乐部 (Vintage Motor Cycle Club) 的 Banbury Run 赛事 9.35 电影:Time Bandits (PG, 1981) 由 Craig Warnock 和 David Rappaport 主演的奇幻喜剧片 11.50 星际迷航:奇异新世界 (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds)。船员们遭遇了一名致命的太空海盗 (AD) 12.50am Lost (重播) 1.40-2.30 Motorsport UK 3.30am-4.00 Motorsport Mundial
Sky Docs 6.00am The Nineties (重播) 7.00 Discovering: Denzel Washington (重播) (AD) 8.00 The Directors (重播) (AD) 9.00 Ren Faire (重播) (AD) 10.00 The Man Who Played with Fire (重播) 11.00 Murder in Boston: Roots, Rampage and Reckoning (重播) 12.00 电影:Dave Not Coming Back (PG, 2020) 2.00pm SIC: Prince of MotoGP (重播) 3.40 My Icon: Tanni Grey Thompson (第一部分) (重播) (AD) 4.00 The Directors (重播) (AD) 5.00 Discovering: Denzel Washington (重播) (AD) 6.00 电影:I Am Jackie O (12, 2020) 杰基·肯尼迪-奥纳西斯 (Jackie Kennedy Onassis) 的纪录片人物志 (AD) 7.45 My Icon: Denise Lewis (重播) (AD) 8.00 Murder at the Cottage (重播) (AD) 11.00 I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not (重播) (AD) 1.00am Anatomy of Lies (重播) 4.05 The Directors (重播) (AD) 5.00am-6.00 Discovering: Denzel Washington (重播) (AD)
在闪击战期间的伦敦。对于九岁的比尔 (Bill, 由 Sebastian Rice-Edwards 饰演) 来说,炸弹坑就是游乐场。即使他的姐姐 (Sammi Davis) 在空袭期间也会惊呼:“快来看烟花!” 凭借其怀旧的基调,这部电影与 Boorman 早期的作品风格大相径庭,但它依然为魔幻现实主义找到了空间,例如当一个系留气球在屋顶上脱离控制时。Boorman 凭借导演和剧本获得了奥斯卡提名,该片获得了最佳影片提名。 (108分钟) James Jackson
11.00am 《黄山》(The Yellow Mountain) (PG, 1954) 西部片,由 Howard Duff 主演 12.35pm 《野性的呼唤》(The Call of the Wild) (PG, 2020) 历史冒险片,由 Harrison Ford 主演 (AD) 2.30 《三百勇士》(The 300 Spartans) (PG, 1962) 历史剧,由 Richard Egan 主演 4.45 《英勇王子》(Prince Valiant) (U, 1954) 冒险片,由 Robert Wagner 主演 6.45 《独立日:重生》(Independence Day: Resurgence) (12, 2016) 科幻冒险片,由 Jeff Goldblum 和 Liam Hemsworth 主演 (AD) 9.00 《没那么简单》(No Hard Feelings) (15, 2023) 一名绝望的女性同意与一对富有夫妇那性格古怪的儿子约会,以强迫他走出封闭的自我。喜剧片,由 Jennifer Lawrence 主演 (AD) 11.05 《Passing》 (12, 2021) 历史剧,由 Tessa Thompson 和 Ruth Negga 主演 (b/w) 1.05am-3.20 《愤怒的恩典》(Raging Grace) (15, 2023) 恐怖片,由 Max Eigenmann 出演
6.00am 电视购物 7.20 《警队》(The Bill) 8.15 《医生》(Doctors) 9.25 《经典荷比城市》(Classic Holby City) 10.40 《急诊》(Casualty) (AD) 11.40 《警队》(The Bill) 12.45pm 《经典东区》(Classic EastEnders) 2.00 《邻居》(Neighbours) 3.00 《天上的派》(Pie in the Sky) 4.00 《洛夫乔伊》(Lovejoy) 5.20 《等待上帝》(Waiting for God) 6.00 《夏日之终》(Last of the Summer Wine) 6.40 《夏日之终》(Last of the Summer Wine) 7.20 《夏日之终》(Last of the Summer Wine) 8.00 《布罗肯伍德谜案》(The Brokenwood Mysteries)。Shepherd 遇到了一名喉咙被割开的圣诞老人 (4/4) (AD) 10.00 《新线索》(New Tricks)。在发现染血衣物后,一起 1971 年的失踪案被重新开启 (6/7) (AD) 11.00 《沉默的证人》(Silent Witness)。一名移民官员将一根截断的手指带到了莱尔中心 (AD) 1.30am 《洛夫乔伊》(Lovejoy) 2.35 《等待上帝》(Waiting for God) 3.05 《达比和琼》(Darby and Joan) (SL) 4.00am-6.00 电视购物
6.10am 《被遗弃的工程》(Abandoned Engineering) (AD) 8.00 《破车与现金》(Bangers & Cash) (AD) 10.00 《秘密纳粹基地》(Secret Nazi Bases) 11.00 《俯瞰二战》(World War Two from Above) 12.00 《古董路演》(Antiques Roadshow) 2.00pm 《破车与现金:修复经典》(Bangers & Cash: Restoring Classics) (AD) 4.00 《秘密纳粹基地》(Secret Nazi Bases) 5.00 《俯瞰二战》(World War Two from Above) 6.00 《古董路演》(Antiques Roadshow) 7.00 《亚洲:群山》(Asia. The mountains) (AD) 8.00 《1066:征服英格兰之年》(1066: A Year to Conquer England)。威廉公爵率领他的入侵舰队横跨英吉利海峡 9.00 《波蒂略的帝国之旅》(Portillo’s Empire Journey)。Michael Portillo 访问牙买加 (2/4) 10.00 《破车与现金:修复经典》(Bangers & Cash: Restoring Classics)。一台 Series 1 路虎 (AD) 11.00 《破车与现金:修复经典》(Bangers & Cash: Restoring Classics)。一台 1981 年的 Silver Spirit (AD) 12.00 《破车与现金》(Bangers & Cash) (AD) 1.00am 《寻找、修复、出售》(Find It, Fix It, Flog It) (AD) 2.00 《伟大的英国铁路之旅》(Great British Railway Journeys) 3.00am-6.10 电视购物
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通用知识填字游戏 第 348 号
E D
C
R
R
1 2 3 4 5 8 7 6
9 10
11 12
14 15 16
18 19
21 22
24 25 26
27 28
横向 1 拥有古遗址基雷奈 (Cyrene) 和莱普提斯马格纳 (Leptis Magna) 的非洲国家 (5)
A N
C A
4 用于调节心律的人造装置 (9)
L O
E L
T O
P
9 Moules ---,经典法式
海鲜菜肴 (9) 10 田径队项目 (5) 11 自 1976 年起越南对西贡的正式名称 (2,3,4,4) 14 圣经中记载奇迹婚礼宴席的地点 (4) 15 位于米ドル伯勒 (Middlesbrough) 和桑德兰 (Sunderland) 之间的港口 (10) 18 四音步的诗行 (10) 19 为配备超大屏幕而建的电影院的电影格式 (4) 21 《英国烘焙大赛》(The Great British Bake Off) 新任命的评委 (7,6) 24 马克思兄弟 (Marx Brothers) 中最年长的一位 (5) 25 城镇包括布拉克内尔 (Bracknell) 和纽伯里 (Newbury) 的郡 (9)
上周答案
, 6 2 % $ 7 + 6 : + & ( 8 5 $ / $ 1 % $ / / 7 $ 5 1 , 0 5 , $ 6 6 + $ 5 2 1 + 2 5 * $ 1 & ( 6 9 2 , * 0 $ * 1 8 6 $ / / 6 3 , & ( 3 % , 5 9 5 ) ( / 8 & & $ 6 7 5 $ 8 6 6 $ 5 & 2 1 $ & + , 1 $ 7 ( $ 5 2 : , 1 * ( ( 2 % 7 , 6 & + $ 5 / , ( % 5 2 : 1 . $ 5 % $ , . ( 5 1 5 $ 0 3 / , 1 * 6 / , ' 6 1 ( / ( 0 ( 1 7 6
KenKen 简单 6895 号
使用
27 杜兰杜兰 (Duran Duran) 那首询问“你为什么不用它?”的冠军单曲 (3,6) 28 --- 大犬,包含天狼星的星座 (5)
向下 1 一种白细胞 (10) 2 等于 100,000 帕斯卡 (pascals) 的压力单位 (3) 3 维吉尔 (Virgil) 的史诗 (6) 4 除主语以外的句子所有部分 (9) 5 “robot”和“polka”一词来源的语言 (5) 6 鲍勃 ---,《Satsuma Complex》的漫画作者 (8) 7 2004 年奥运会女子 800 米和 1500 米的英国金牌得主 (5,6) 8 2025 年热门歌曲《Where Is My Husband!》的伦敦出生歌手 (4) 12 第一位采纳基督教的罗马皇帝 (11) 13 欧芹科的可食用野生植物 (10) 16 1999 年由基努·里维斯 (Keanu Reeves) 饰演 Neo 的科幻电影 (3,6) 17 具有气根的形成沼泽的热带植物 (8) 20 大约等于三个四分之一光年的单位 (6) 22 诽谤材料的出版 (5) 23 例如詹姆斯·瓦特 (James Watt) 或约翰·洛吉·贝尔德 (John Logie Baird) (4) 26 --- 希斯洛普 (Hislop),讽刺作家兼《Private Eye》杂志编辑 (3)
密码字 (Codeword) 5903 号
在这个十字谜题风格的网格中,每个字母都由 1 到 26 的数字代表。
字母表中的每个字母在网格中至少出现一次。使用已提供的字母来推断其他字母的身份。在主网格和较小的参考网格中填入字母,直到字母表中的全部 26 个字母都被确认。专有名词除外。周六答案见右侧。
Cluelines 陷入密码字困境?如需接收 4 个随机线索,请拨打 0901 293 6262 或发送 TIMECODE 至 64343。通话费用为 £1 加上您的电话公司网络接入费。短信费用为 £1 加上您的标准网络费。获取完整答案请拨打 0905 757 0142。如果您持有旧报纸并需要过去 7 天的线索,请拨打 0905 624 0024。拨打 0905 的费用为每分钟 £1 加上您的电话公司网络接入费。SP: Spoke, 0333 202 3390 (周一至周五, 上午 9 点至下午 5.30 点)。
Lexica 简单 9017 号 困难 9018 号
W T
将字母水平或垂直地滑回网格中,以完成十字谜题。字母允许滑过其他字母。
Futoshiki 5443 号
数字
X L
Kakuro 4402 号
Train Tracks 2928 号
© PUZZLER MEDIA
Quintagram® 2630 号
使用下方每个字母仅一次,解答所有五个隐喻谜题 (cryptic clues)
1 他的伴侣的亡妻重复了结婚誓言 (5)
2 囚犯可能会开始表现出抵抗力? (5)
3 渴望吃掉两种水果中的一半 (6)
4 轻率的女主角捕捉到了危险动物 (7)
5 音乐作品被转化为剧院作品 (9)
A A C D E E E E
H H I I N N O O
O O P P P R R R
R R T T W W W Y
铺设轨道,使火车能从 A 村旅行到 B 村。
指示每行和每列中有多少段轨道。只有直线段和曲线段。轨道不能交叉。
你的思维 通过来自 《泰晤士报》的 益智书
timesbookshop.co.uk
黑方走子。 此局面出自 Zhao-Pranav,香港 2026。
黑王被困在 中心,这在 传统上被认为是 “坏事”。国王 通常在安全地 躲在王翼或 后翼时会感到更快乐。白王 在王翼,但 远非安全。为什么?
填满网格
数字 1 到 9
每个中的 数字
水平或 垂直的
白色方块 序列
白色方块。
总和等于 其左侧或 上方的 三角形中的 总数。
同一个数字 在同一行或 同一列中 可以出现 多次,但不能 在同一序列的
15 思维游戏
第 10,219 号 大脑训练器
大脑 训练器
2 3 4 5 6 7
9
11
14 15
18 19
22 23
1 当前的,非常近期的 (2,2,3,6)
8 自命不凡的喋喋不休者 (7)
9 逐渐褪色 (5)
10 小麦穗 (3)
11 树栖啮齿类动物 (8)
13 毫无尊严地对待 (6)
14 棕榈纤维 (6)
17 文学作品中的女家庭教师 (4,4)
S T
F R I E N D S E N O L N A U S I M U L C A S T M E N O A E G E E B M A S H P O R R I D G E S B N I A C H E E R S B O T T O M U O F R E R E D D W A R F T A X I A A N E I C M T A N O W N E R S H I P E C W Z I E L S H E L L E Y S O R R Y
底部。
A S
需要今天的谜题帮助?请致电 0905 757 0143 查询答案。
通话费用每分钟 £1,另加您电话公司的网络接入费。SP: Spoke, 0333 202 3390 (周一至周五 上午9点-下午5.30点)。
Andrew Robson
57届 欧洲 桥牌 国家队锦标赛 最近在拉脱维亚里加结束。 我开门见山地说——英格兰 赢得了女子组比赛。 这一辉煌成就之所以更加难能可贵,是因为三个对子中的一对,Charlotte Bedford 和 Lucy Norman,两人均在青少年时期。她们绝非“第三对”——事实上,她们在比赛末段引领了全队。 在与以色列的决赛中需要一场大胜,Bedford-Norman 配合另一桌始终可靠的(好吧,不仅如此,而且是卓越的)Nicola Smith-Nevena Senior,连续确保了三次两位数的 IMP 领先。 在第一次中,Bedford-Norman 叫并完成了 6♥,手牌如下。
在方片领先出牌时,庄家(西位)赢得出牌并打出黑桃A-黑桃Q,以弃掉她的方片(因为南位持有K,因此成功)。这是必要的,因为北位持有红心K。 在实际操作中,北位出她的单张-
♥AQ108743 ♦95 ♣AJ10
♥J5 ♦A1063 ♣KQ84
N W E S
N W E S
Pass 2♥ Pass 2NT
Pass 3♥ Pass 4♣(2)
Pass 4♦(3) Pass 4NT(4)
Pass 5♠(5) Pass 6♥ End
(1) Two-over-One 强迫叫至局。 (2) 控制叫法(第一或第二轮控制),约定红心。 (3) 最后一次传递(甩锅)。 (4) 罗马关键牌 Blackwood 叫法。 (5) 两个“五张 A”(含 ♥K);外加 ♥Q。
21 庞大的人群 (5)
22 幸运地 (7)
24 在时间不多的时候仍然未解决 (4,2,3,4)
1 笨重的,尴尬的 (8)
2 发脾气 (7)
3 拍打 (3)
4 小件餐具 (6)
5 激怒 (9)
6 过多的,不必要的 (5)
7 (电流)漩涡 (4)
11 声明 (9)
12 怪诞的水龙卷 (8)
15 意大利电影导演
16 鞋带孔 (6)
18 箭矢 (5)
20 室外储藏棚 (4)
23 作为提醒的
这是下一局。
每位庄家都完成了 4♠ —— 通过先出低牌到 J 然后出 A 来收回 the spades,击落了东家的 K。除了一个人 —— v 贝德福德-诺曼。贝德福德领出了一张错误的 9♠,诱使庄家试图钉住她的 ♠97 双顿持牌,结果用 dummy 的 Q 覆盖,浪费了一个不必要的 spades 技巧。 在第三局中,你持有 ♠10, ♥AQJ873, ♦KQJ10, ♣108,并听到叫牌过程为 1♠-2♥ (你)-3♠ (抢双)-Pass-Pass 回到你这里(脆弱 v 非脆弱)。以色列选手选择了 Pass;3♠ 掉了三墩,得分为 +150。资深选手通过第二轮强迫叫-out double 介入,并在 Smith 叫 4♥ 后得分 +620。andrew.robson@thetimes.co.uk
♠Q83 ♥KQ8 ♦KJ106 ♣K32
♥AJ93 ♦532 ♣A74
♥1065 ♦Q874 ♣J1065
♥742 ♦A9 ♣Q98
1♠ Pass 1NT Pass
2♣(2) Pass 3♠(3) Pass
4♠ End
(1) 采用强 Notrump 体系且草花牌短。 (2) Checkback Stayman。 (3) 具有三张 spades 的最大值。
4 1/ OF IT
40 + 24 ÷ 4 x 2 – 30 x 7 – 22 SQUARE
x 6 ÷ 3 ÷ 4 x 5 + 23 – 42 3 1/ OF IT
67% OF IT – 27 TIMES ITSELF ÷ 8 5/19 OF IT
Set Square No 4405
Killer Gentle No 10,844
Tricky No 10,845
与标准数独一样,填充网格,使每行、每列以及每个 3x3 宫格包含数字 1 到 9。由虚线连接的每组单元格之和必须等于其左上角的方框内目标数字。在每组由虚线连接的单元格内
1/ OF IT + – 131
OF IT – 155
利用这些字母,组成三个或更多字母的单词,且必须包含中心字母。答案必须出自《牛津简明词典》,排除专有名词、复数、动词变位(过去式等)、以 LY 结尾的副词、比较级和最高级。
评分标准:12 个单词为平均水平;16 个为良好;20 个为非常好;25 个为卓越。
周六答案
acuity, ascitic, attic, autist, autistic, cactus, cast, catsuit, catty, caustic, causticity, cist, city, cutis, cutty, cyst, cystic, ictus, sati, scat, scatty, sciatic, scut, stat, static, stay, suit, sutta, tacit, tact, tactic, tasty, taut, titi
快速隐喻 3362 (Quick Cryptic 3362)
隐喻 (Cryptic)
Tredoku 1952
Square Routes
数独 16,976 (Sudoku 16,976)
Killer 10,843
No 5786
© PUZZLER MEDIA
© PUZZLER MEDIA
请注意,BODMAS(运算优先级)不适用
密码字 5902 (Codeword 5902)
U Y A L A F E T O N U R N G C H C A E H
Lexica 9011 Set Square 4403
Futoshiki 5441
KenKen 6894
Quintagram
Quintagram
2 Rhine 3 White 4 Sparkling 5 Fortified
2 Power 3 Cherry 4 Panther 5 Operation
词汇观察 (Word watch)
Spinto (a) 一种抒情演唱嗓音 (Collins) Purdonium (b) 一种煤铲 (Chambers)
国际象棋 —— 获胜走法
将网格 划分为正方形或 长方形 区块,每个区块 仅包含一个 数字。每个 区块必须 包含由其内部 数字所示的 单元格数量。
在六个算式中 填入 1 到 9 的 每个数字。我们 已经填入两个 数字帮你开始。 每个算式 应自左向右或 自上而下计算。
Kakuro 4400
Train Tracks 2927
B E R T H
U T U
R E F U N D
Y U
F L O W
Lexica 9012
O D E V
O B O A
V I A C
E L E A
S E W A G E
Sakuro 4804
中等 51 较难 54
知识竞猜 (Quiz)
4 The Hay Wain 5 Ships 6 Annie Oakley 7 Kate 8 Kiln 9 Catatonia 10 Leon Trotsky 11 Sweetpea 12 Lisp 13 Mizoram 14 Mike Gatting 15 Bernard Levin
Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor Teen anxiety pays more than job
Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor gas-fired plants to replace turbines in re- mote areas that have to be switched off due to cabling bottlenecks, the National Energy System Operator (Neso) says. The costs Neso incurs to manage the electricity system are recovered through household and business energy bills. If the forecast increase materialises, it could add about £10 to the average annual household bill,
Emily Gosden Energy Editor
The cost to consumers of paying wind farms and other power plants to switch off because there is not enough capacity on the transmission network is set to rise by £1 billion to £3.2 billion over the coming year. Most of the cost stems from paying
A firefighter tackles flames in Arès, Gironde, the region worst affected by the wildfires. The authorities have contingency plans in place to evacuate Bordeaux
Daisy Eastlake Political Reporter
Teenagers claiming sickness benefits for anxiety receive £100 a week more than those who take a part-time job on the minimum wage. More than 87,000 16 and 17-year-olds are claiming the personal independ- ence payment (Pip), the non-means- tested benefit intended to cover the extra costs of disability. More than two thirds of those on the upper tier, £194 a week, are claiming for mental health and neurodevelopmen- tal conditions including anxiety, depression, autism and ADHD. A 16-year-old working 12 hours a week, the legal maximum during term
At 39 I took an Alzheimer’s test
time, on the under-18 minimum wage takes home about £94. The same teen- ager, signed off with anxiety, can re- ceive more than double the hourly equivalent while staying at home. Individuals are able to claim Pip re- gardless of whether they are in full- time education or have a job. Eligibility is based on how a physical or mental condition affects their ability to com- plete everyday tasks and get around. This week Andy Burnham will inter- vene on the issue of young people not in education, employment or training (Neets). He is understood to believe a push for further education is essential to bringing down the number of young Neets, which has passed a million for the first time despite 84 per cent of
Monday July 27 2026 | thetimes.com | No 75095
adding further pressure to prices as ministers seek to meet their pledge to cut energy costs. Rising gas prices are driving the bulk of the forecast increase in so-called “constraint costs” because they will make it more expensive to run replacement gas plants, Neso said. Costs will also be driven higher because network companies are taking
them saying they want to work. He will also make a speech on reforming social care. A Downing Street source said the prime minister would spend the week “talking about trying to fix some of the really difficult issues that politicians have avoided for too long”. In his first speech in Downing Street, Burnham said the government would “help more young people into work by changing the education system and giv- ing them more support” and by build- ing more council homes. In a speech last month he said of young people who could not find stable work: “Don’t blame them, blame our- selves. We haven’t been giving people this stability — this ability to get on in life and it’s time we did.”
some power lines out of service temporarily to enable upgrades. This should help solve the issue in the long term but will exacerbate bottlenecks in the short term, it said. Neso has to ensure that supply and demand are balanced across the network at all times so there is enough electricity going from power plants to consumers without overloading wires.
Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, has said she would work with Burnham on cross-party plans on social care, but only if he pledged not to pay for the reforms with tax rises. She said: “You must rule out any tax rises or increased borrowing that will ultimate- ly fall on the next generation to pay for.” A No 10 source said Burnham had committed himself to sticking by Labour’s manifesto pledge not to raise income tax, national insurance or VAT. Helen Whately, the shadow work and pensions secretary, said the “incen- tives are topsy-turvy” and pushing young people towards a life on welfare. She said: “Our sickness benefit system is broken. Instead of being there for the seriously disabled, thousands of teen-
£3.20 £2.35 to subscribers
and the ‘toll’ of a family rift Shane Watson
Constraint costs have surged in recent years as wind farms have been allowed to connect to the network before it has been upgraded to reliably transmit all their power to consumers. Neso is under scrutiny over its ability to manage Britain’s electricity supplies securely after whistleblowers alleged a prolonged drop in frequency on June 23
region, France urges tourists
Tom Gould
The French authorities have told tourists to stay away from the Gironde region while crews battle wildfires. More than 250,000 people had been evacuated from southwestern France by last night. Temperatures are set to rise to 40C from tomorrow, which could aggravate the flames. Almost three million residents across the southwest were advised to stay indoors as much as possible and wear masks outside to combat hazardous levels of fine particles from smoke. Sophie Brocas, the regional prefect, said: “I strongly encourage tourists not to come [and] invite tourists already here to consider another destination.” Lieutenant Colonel Eric Brocardi, a spokesman for French firefighters, said: “The fire front is constantly shifting. We cannot fight it directly. It’s a David versus Goliath scenario. The idea is that, at some point, we’ll find a weak spot and strike there.”
agers are getting nearly £200 a week for anxiety and ADHD. This is absurd.” Between 2024-25 and 2030-31 the number of people claiming incapacity benefits is forecast to rise from 3.4 million to 4 million, and those on disability benefits are predicted to rise from 6.5 million to 8.8 million. Total welfare spending was forecast at more than £320 billion for 2025-26, close to a quarter of all government spending. More than half of total welfare spend- ing went to pensioners. Burnham has said he will not scrap the pension triple lock, which leaves working-age health and disability ben- efits the principal target for any savings. The number of people under 25
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fully funded, vows Streeting
chancellor were committed to invest- ing what we need in defence, I wouldn’t have accepted this role.” Andy Burnham said yesterday: “The first challenge facing us both is to ensure that the defence investment plan is fully funded and that’s the thing that’s right in front of us, and we need to work that through as we go towards the budget later this year.” Burnham said that UK support for Ukraine “remains unwavering” before he welcomes President Zelensky today as his first international visitor since be- coming prime minister. They will visit a naval base, where Burnham will announce that Britain will hand over the intellectual property behind its new “Stone Cloak” electronic warfare system, enabling Ukraine to produce the technology at scale. Streeting has said history will thank President Trump, who has demanded European allies spend more on defence. He told Sky News: “We don’t always like what he says. We don’t always like his methods. But I genuinely think when this period of history is written, Europe
nisation, including an arson attack on four Hatzola ambulances in March. The motion was proposed by Ashok Kumar, a reader in political economy at Birkbeck, University of London. On October 7, 2023, he posted images on X from the Nova music festival where 378 Israelis were killed, saying: “Sometimes partying on stolen land next to a con- centration camp where a million people are starved has consequences.” Kumar said he stood by his motion “and the Palestinian people’s right to resist occupation in accordance with international law because the Green Party should be guided by principle, not act as a vassal of the US empire or stand by while Palestinians are killed”. David Taylor, the Labour MP, said that even considering debating the mo- tion was “absolutely disgraceful”. “Zack Polanski must wake up to the threat Iran poses and make sure this motion, and its proposer, is thrown out of the Green Party immediately,” he said. Conference motions are prioritised by a ballot of members. The Green Party said: “Conference is still months away and although mem- bers have started to submit motions, not everything submitted ends up being discussed.”
the Treasury fails to fund defence investment in full. The new defence secretary was asked on Times Radio whether meeting the spending commitments was a resigna- tion matter for him, as it had been for his predecessor, John Healey, who is now the chancellor. Streeting said: “It is. It is absolutely, for me, a matter of principle.” The defence investment plan was published on June 30 after a year’s delay and promised £15 billion of extra spend- ing. However, the Treasury confirmed only £10.3 billion of it, leaving £4.7 billion — including £1.8 billion re- quired in the next financial year — to be found in the autumn budget. Downing Street, under Sir Keir Starmer, had offered £13 billion com- pared with the Ministry of Defence demand for £18 billion. Healey resigned rather than accept the settlement. Streeting told Times Radio: “If I did not believe this prime minister and this
motion against IRGC ban
debate whether sanctions on Iran should be scrapped and its Revolution- ary Guard spared proscription after the government moved to ban support for the organisation. The motion, tabled before the party’s autumn conference, calls on the gov- ernment to pursue “diplomatic normal- isation” with Tehran and would commit the Greens to campaigning for the lift- ing of economic sanctions. It said that the party would oppose “the proscription or designation of Iranian state institutions, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps” (IRGC), because such measures were “counterproductive, undermine diplo- macy, close channels for engagement and reduce opportunities for mediation and peacebuilding”. There is no mention in the motion of the IRGC’s activities in Britain. MI5 has disrupted numerous Iranian-backed plots to kidnap or kill people on British soil since 2022, and on July 13 the gov- ernment banned support for the IRGC under new National Security Act pow- ers. The ban followed seven attacks in the UK which were linked to the orga-
Wind farm switch-off costs
Analysis by Ben Watts, an energy con- sultant, showed that on that day wind farms off Scotland had to be paid to stop generating, several plants in the south were out for maintenance and subsea cables to Europe were exporting power out of southern England. Internal Neso reports obtained by The Times showed constraints were breached on five lines where more power was being sent along cables than should have been during the crunch. Separately, ministers were advised against pressing ahead with switching off digital terrestrial television from 2034 because it is the only communica- tions network capable of continuing to broadcast through a long power cut. The National Preparedness Com-
The front-page Times story from
Saturday highlighting a Neso report
retain digital terrestrial TV until at least 2044, warning that broadband routers fail immediately when electricity sup- plies are lost and phone masts typically have back-up power lasting between 30 minutes and six hours. Main TV trans- mitters can continue broadcasting for about seven days on diesel generators. Lord Harris of Haringey, the com- mission chairman, said: “The question for government is much more than how people will watch television in future, but how the country will communicate when internet-based systems fail.”
us out of our complacency and forcing us to stand on our own two feet.” However, he repeatedly declined to back a target of 3 per cent of GDP being spent on de- fence by 2030, and insisted the timetable was a matter for the chancellor. The defence secretary confirmed he had spoken to Pete Hegseth, the US secretary of war, on Friday and expect- ed to do so again within days. He told Sky News: “I was clear that we’ve not supported offensive action in Iran and we won’t support offensive action in Iran, but there are plenty of things that we can and should do together when it comes to securing the Strait of Hormuz, in making sure Iran doesn’t develop nu- clear weapons, in terms of investing in our capability and Nato’s capability.” A source close to Streeting said: “Wes was not threatening to quit. He simply said that properly funding our national defence is a matter of principle and he wouldn’t have taken the job if the PM hadn’t made clear he and the chan- cellor share that commitment.”
Teen anxiety pays more than job
2019 to 2024, driven by claims for mental ill-health and neurodivergence. Teen- agers make up a small proportion of the more than four million people claiming Pip. Real-terms spending on the benefit is forecast to rise from £26 billion in 2024-25 to £45 billion by 2031. An interim review by Sir Stephen Timms, the disability minister, pub- lished this month, found evidence dis- ability benefits in some cases “disincen- tivised” employment by handing claim- ants an “alternative source of income”. Deven Ghelani, one of the architects of the universal credit system, said the Pip assessment had never been de- signed for the conditions now driving the surge in claims. He said: “It’s a box- ticking exercise rather than a behav- ioural, psychological or social interven- tion as originally intended.” Ministers are understood to be devis- ing reforms to the benefit system and have examined how payments work in the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany and Australia, each of which has had more success in getting young people back into work. The government said: “The Timms review interim report is clear Pip, as de- signed in 2013, is no longer fit for pur- pose, and the final recommendations due this autumn will lay the foundation for reform.”
sitive to wholesale costs, weather and network failures, adding: “Seventy-five per cent of the forecast cost is due to the limitations of the current network.” A spokesman added: “Keeping balancing costs down over the long term will depend on reforms to the electricity market and continued network expan- sion, which are outside Neso’s control.” The government said: “There is a strong case for a long-term transition to IPTV [internet protocol TV, which uses an internet connection instead of stan- dard cable or satellite], but no decisions have been made. We understand the importance of information access in times of national emergency ... Any future transition would only proceed once we are confident the right safe- guards ... are in place.”
S1 3 News
Harry crashes Meghan’s TV cameo
Channel 10
the duchess while she was a guest judge on MasterChef Australia, writes Poppy Koronka
MasterChef Australia
appearance on MasterChef Australia when he called his wife during her cameo on the programme. The Duchess of Sussex described Harry as a “charmer” after he made the video call during the filming of her episode. Meghan appeared as a guest judge in the 18th season of the cooking series yesterday as contestants were chal- lenged to transform a staple ingredient into a dish “fit for a duchess”. The couple spoke during the episode’s judging segment, when Harry made an unexpected call. “Hi, my love,” she said after producers handed her the phone, introducing Harry to the contestants and judges and showing him the dishes. “My husband’s here,” she said. The episode was filmed during Meghan and Harry’s week-long trip to Australia in April. The duchess praised contestant Aaron Kher’s dish but joked it packed “too much” spice for Harry, who greeted the Australian group with a “g’day”. “He’s a charmer, isn’t he?” she said after the phone call ended. Meghan said during the episode: “Family time, I think, is really key to con- nect through food, so as many meals as we can do together, we always do.” She said Harry’s British upbringing meant he pre- ferred “meat, potatoes and cream sauce” while the Californian-born duchess favoured grilled meats, fish and citrus. While she admitted that the family had differing palates, she said their children still enjoyed Brussels sprouts. A previous announcement from the Sussexes described the new season as featuring some of the “most impressive
The Duchess of
her the phone
Television Charlotte Ivers
thinking, the most exciting day of the MasterChef Australia team’s lives. They are about to welcome a guest “beyond [the contestants’] wildest imaginations”. The set is decked out in flowers and red velvet, and we are told to expect a judge who is “a global icon, a philanthropist, a humanitarian, a woman known around the world [for] her heart, her voice and her deep love for home cooking”. And so of course, clad in black silk and walking down the red carpet to flashing lights and great whoops from assembled wellwishers, here comes the Duchess of Sussex. MasterChef Australia is a far bigger, brasher affair than its British counterpart. A crowd cheer and pump their fists from a balcony when a chef
ever seen”. The duke and duchess’s Australia visit also included meetings with men- tal health charities, Invictus veterans, as well as survivors and emergency service personnel from the Bondi
rare. Such things are a hard watch for a buttoned-up Brit, but are — one suspects — far more appealing to our super-saccharine, ever-so-sincere Californian duchess. We are a quarter of an hour into the 90-minute (90 minutes!) show before anybody so much as picks up a spoon. During this preamble, we are treated to a slightly excruciating stand-up interview with … well, “Do I call you duchess?” asks one excitable host. “Oh, call me Meghan,” our hero trills. The love-in is mutual. Does Meghan like MasterChef, asks the host and former contestant Poh Ling Yeow. At this point in the enthusiasm fest, I would give everything I own for Her Meghanness to just say “no”. No such luck. “Oh my gosh, of course! Who isn’t a MasterChef fan? It’s such a great show.” Also in favour: Australia (“We’re so excited, we love Australia”), carrots (“love carrots”) and “being able to nurture through food”. The duchess’s husband, we are told, “being from the UK, loves a lot of meat, potatoes, cream sauces”. But
Poh Ling Yeow.
lia. We had the most sentimental, amazing time. We were here almost eight years ago,” the duchess said of her visit. “We announced we were pregnant with Archie at the time. It’s full circle.” When she announced her participa-
spice: “He can handle a really good curry.” She feels very blessed to have a large garden and lots of produce on hand. When her children ask, “Mama, can I have dessert?”, she replies, “If you can pick it, you can have it.” We learn that Meghan likes a mixture of savoury and sweet food, and is
Meghan keeps us waiting on whether
the celeriac ice cream is a winner
instead of “basil”. All that is left, following extensive gushing, is for Meghan to set a task for the four blushing contestants (“It’s like speaking to your first crush,” one says). The pull of a rope reveals a
was “an easy yes” because of “two things: my love of food and my love of Australia”. She added: “It’s such a great show. I’m just really honoured that I was asked to be able to be here with you and to be able to judge some of these
lemon, honey, strawberries, celeriac and apples, among others. Meghan’s hope is that the contestants will pick an ingredient which “almost feels like an heirloom” and base a dish around it. Perhaps the ingredient should be related to “something from your family” or a memory. For two of the four contestants, this ingredient turns out to be celeriac. We get celeriac ice cream, and celeriac and steak. One other guy is up to something with carrots. After much celeriac-based faffing, Meghan is asked to declare to the contestants that they have 30 minutes remaining. She refuses to shout this out to the whole room, and instead heads to the workstation of each contestant to tell them individually. “She looks through your soul a little bit when you’re talking to her” is the contestant Casper’s response to this interaction. He is making octopus with Jerusalem artichoke puree. When Meghan likes it, he looks as if she has just proposed marriage. We are now getting into the judging in earnest. “I mentioned my husband
Sussex in the
episode with
Sofia Levin and
She took a
video-call from
her husband,
saying “Hi,
my love” as
producers gave
Harry and Meghan shared holiday pictures of themselves and their child- ren, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, on Instagram. The holiday included visiting Princess Diana’s childhood home at the Althorp estate in North- amptonshire. In one shot, Lilibet, five, walks through trees behind Harry and her brother while in another Archie, seven, is barefoot in a pair of shorts. Diana is buried on a secluded island called Oval Lake at Althorp, her family’s nearly 13,000-acre estate which is now owned by her younger brother, Charles Spencer. It is not accessible to the public. Known for her love of food, Meghan has sold her own jam and hosted a Net- flix lifestyle series, With Love, Meghan. The show has now been nominated for an Emmy in the lifestyle category after its second season.
This feels like the most elegant elevated version of that. H would love this dish,” Meghan informs Mr Celeriac and Steak. Is there a chef alive who has not dreamed of hearing that Harry Windsor would like his steak? Carrot man is up next, but who is this? A producer scuttles on screen: “Sorry to interrupt. We’ve had a phone call to the studio.” And up pops the ginger mug of the man himself on a video call: “What’s going on? Have I interrupted something?” “It’s amazing. They are so talented. We wish you were here” the duchess trills. “He’s in Canberra now. With the veterans,” she adds, for our benefit. By the end, I am perplexed as to who is going to leave the competition, because she has adored every dish. As it is, we do not learn who will depart in this episode. We must wait another day, when the contestants will also receive letters from their loved ones, as if they are soldiers in the trenches, not men cooking carrots. How could we resist tuning in? Charlotte Ivers is the Sunday Times TV critic
‘We swam as the black ash fell,
residents and tourists nervously check for updates, David Chazan reports from Bordeaux
B O R D E A U X
The Davis family watched the village of Le Porge burn from the far side of Lake Lacanau, where they were camping just over two miles away. “The sun went bright red,” said Adam Davis, 56, director of children’s services for Wokingham council. “It was horri- ble. We felt so hot after we arrived on Friday that we went for a swim in the lake and we realised there was a layer of ash on the surface of the water and black ash was falling on us.” He was on a sailing holiday with his wife, Helen, 48, who works for child- ren’s services for Hillingdon, and his son James, ten. Despite their misgivings, they decid- ed to stay on in the hope that the fires would die down. “The next morning we bought our baguette and croissants while everyone was leaving and then I thought, we’d better be sensible and get out of here,” Mrs Davis said. The Davises said they never received any official evacuation alert. “We were told warnings would be sent to French mobiles and then the campsite would sound sirens for those of us without them,” Mrs Davis said. “But we never heard any sirens.” Mr Davis added: “Technically we’re not evacuees as no one told us to go, but there were only a dozen people left on the campsite and we decided to join the exodus. The campsite management was trying to reassure people that it wasn’t in an area affected by the fires. It was a bit like Jaws when the police chief tells people to get out of the water while the mayor insists the beach is safe.” The family drove to Bordeaux and checked into a hotel while they decided what to do next. “We’ll be out of here on Monday,” Mrs Davis said. “We’ve got friends who are in the Alps so we may go there, or we might do a road trip and then go home.” It was not until Sunday that the French authorities advised holiday- makers to stay away from the Gironde region where Bordeaux is located. Until then, tourists had been told not to cancel their plans, but with the fires still raging out of control despite the de- ployment of 2,500 firefighters, 1,500 soldiers and water-bombing planes, of- ficials finally changed their advice. “I strongly encourage tourists not to come, not to enter Gironde,” Sophie Brocas, the regional prefect, said. “I also invite tourists who are already here to consider another destination.” The Davises were among more than 300,000 people in France and Spain forced to flee their homes or cancel hol- idays. In southwestern France alone, more than a quarter of a million people have been evacuated, most of them in Gironde. Thousands of evacuees were sleep- ing on camp beds in vast hangar-like buildings at Bordeaux’s Exhibition Centre. One of them, Stéphane Lafitte, was evacuated with his wife and French bulldog, Bobby, from their home in Saint-Médard-en Jalles. “Our whole town was evacuated. About 20,000 people left after we got alerts warning us to go late on Friday,” said Lafitte, 52. “My son is with my parents in Pau. He’s lucky not to be here.” He said the authorities had been ill- prepared for the wildfires. “With cli- mate change, this is happening every
Adam Davis, his wife Helen and son James, 10, were camping at Lake Lacanau but decided to evacuate. He could see the village of Le Porge burning, top left, on
year now. Our firefighting planes are made in Canada but France should be making its own.” Many evacuees said they were wor- ried that their homes could be looted. A man was arrested on suspicion of burg- lary while driving away from an evacu- ated area with more than 40 bottles of expensive vintage wine. Croatia has lent France two water- bombing planes and other European countries have sent emergency work- ers. Edward Chisholm and his family fled their holiday home on the Cap Ferret peninsula when it was evacuated last week. Chisholm, 38, a British author who lives in Switzerland, said he was checking wind direction and govern- ment updates by the hour before decid- ing whether to leave the region. He had been staying in a rental villa in Grand Piquey with his girlfriend and four-year-old son but left after the fire tore through the area’s pine forests. Chisholm described “apocalyptic” scenes as they drove away, with houses boarded up and plumes of smoke bil- lowing over them. “There’s only one road, so as the fire
10 miles
Source: Nasa Firms
spread, [the authorities] were increas- ingly worried that people wouldn’t be able to get off the peninsula. So they started to evacuate,” he said. “It was a ghost town. It had this weird atmosphere … All the houses around, everyone was packing their stuff up and the sky was a burnt colour. We could smell smoke and there was ash falling.” Across the water from the Cap Ferret peninsula, where Chisholm is now stay- ing with his family in the seaside town of Arcachon, the area remains under a “black alert”. Some beaches are closed and leisure and sports events in high-risk areas have been banned. Rail services to Bor-
deaux have been cancelled and a sec- tion of the nearby A63 motorway, the main artery leading to the Spanish bor- der, has been shut. “There’s quite a surreal atmosphere,” Chisholm said. “There are columns of smoke on the horizon. We are having to keep an eye on all the news. It’s like the beginning of Covid when no one really knew what was going on.” On Sunday, flames up to 40 metres high rose from pine trees that burnt like matchsticks in Marcheprime, about 15 miles west of Bordeaux. The authorities have reportedly made contingency plans to evacuate the city of 267,000 people. Thomas Cazenave, the mayor, said the fire was just nine miles from the outskirts of Bordeaux and the author- ities were “ready for anything”, but he downplayed the situation, saying “no evacuation is scheduled for now”. The regional health agency warned that the proportion of fine particles had reached hazardous levels and advised people to stay indoors as much as poss- ible and wear face masks outdoors. “We have exceeded the fine particle alert thresholds in four departments of
Active wildfires
the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region,” said Cécile Tagliana, deputy director of the regional health agency, without speci- fying a figure. She advised residents to close their windows. She added that 2.5 million FFP2 breathing masks were being distributed to pharmacies and should be worn out- doors. Conventional FFP1 masks do not provide sufficient protection, doctors said. The fires could get worse, Brocas warned. “From Tuesday, unfortunately, the temperature is set to rise again to very high levels of 38C or 40C and that could aggravate the phenomenon,” the prefect told a news conference. About 240 homes have been de- stroyed and 75 firefighters injured in southwestern France. Wildfires are al- so raging in the Alps, in the hills north of the Riviera, and in Corsica. Two fire- fighters died last week in Gironde. One person was arrested for smoking in a forest and two others for having barbecues. Many fires are believed to have been started either by arsonists or as a result of careless behaviour. Additional reporting by Shanti Das, Lara Bowman and David Sharrock
bought our croissants and fled’ Thousands evacuated but Spain’s wildfires coming under control
the far side of the lake. Above: a fire in La Adrada, in Avila province, Spain, has become the country’s biggest on record
Shanti Das
The UK is to face its fourth heatwave of the summer this week with hot and dry conditions creating a risk of “excep- tionally severe” wildfires, the Met Office has warned. After a spattering of rain and cooler temperatures yesterday, forecasters predict parts of southern England will again meet their heatwave criteria on Wednesday, with highs of 32C or 33C. In other areas, the threshold — defined as unusually high temperatures for that area, lasting more than three days — will probably be met on Thursday. There is likely to be a “north-south split”, according to the Met Office — with Northern Ireland, Scotland and northern England experiencing clouds and rain instead of sustained sun. In the south, the extreme heat is likely to be short-lived, with temperatures drop- ping back to normal by the weekend. But the latest run of hot weather means this month could end up being
among the hottest Julys on record — with temperatures across the UK about 3C above average. In Scotland, a major incident was declared in the Cairngorms National Park over the weekend, with residents of one village evacuated after weather aggravated a fire that had been raging since the middle of the month. More than 500 firefighters were deployed. According to the Met Office, southern England has had 1 per cent of its average July rainfall while England has had 5 per cent and the UK as a whole 20 per cent. Dan Stroud, the senior operational meteorologist, said: “In terms of wildfire, obviously the continuation of the dry and hot conditions does elevate the fire risk. That risk continues.” This is most likely to be an issue from Wednesday in pockets of east, south- east and southern England, according to Met Office data used by Natural England and Natural Resources Wales. Heatwaves are placing a strain on infrastructure, health services and the
DIEGO RADAMES/ANADOLU/GETTY IMAGES
economy. During the last one earlier this month, rail passengers were advised to avoid all but essential travel on some routes. More than 1,000 flights were delayed or cancelled in late June after thunderstorms followed extreme heat in southeast England. Some schools, shops and offices closed early. This time more than 300 people across the V&A museum’s four London sites are balloting for a heat- wave strike due to concerns about high temperatures, The Guardian reported. More than 2,700 people are thought to have died from heat-related causes during the May and June heatwaves in England and Wales, according to a team at Imperial College London, the Met Office and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. There is also an economic cost: ac- cording to an analysis by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change, the UK’s June heatwave led to more than £1 billion in lost economic output.
David Sharrock Madrid
Wildfires which have forced the evacu- ation of nearly 80,000 people continue to burn around Madrid but are being contained, the government said on the third day of a national emergency. Fire evacuations were also taking place in the Valencia region, where a man has died in a wildfire in Manises, Spain’s first recorded victim in the emergency. “We still have some difficult hours ahead,” the prime minister Pedro Sán- chez said as he visited fire-hit areas in Ávila, where the blaze officially became Spain’s biggest on record yesterday after consuming 50,000 hectares. “We have a window of opportunity this weekend to fight the wildfire and, therefore, to protect lives, protect pop- ulation centres and, ultimately, to bring this very serious wildfire under control as far as possible,” he said. Fernando Martín Pascual, the depu- ty head of the Military Emergency Unit, said they were working “with great efficiency to contain and stabi- lise” the fires in Ávila, Madrid and Toledo on many of their fronts. “On many occasions, the situation exceeds our fire-fighting capacity, although we are finding ways to con- tain the fires with the appropriate lines of defence,” he said. The Sierra de Madrid, west of the capital, is traditionally a summer refuge for Madrileños seeking cooler nights away from the city. But the past four days have altered the landscape and the sight of thousands of evacuees camping in sports centres has shocked many. A total of 76,000 people in Spain have been evacuated while 30,000 others have been confined to their homes, according to latest government figures released yesterday. Sánchez said his government would on Tuesday declare a civil protection emergency in fire-affected regions, unlocking recovery funding. More than 150,000 hectares have burnt across
Spain this year alone, six times the area destroyed during the same period last year, requiring “a major public pact on the climate emergency” that would align central government and regional administrations, he said. Rival political parties, the conserva- tive Popular Party (PP) and Sanchez´s Socialists have declared a truce, in contrast to the blame game which accompanied the Valencia floods in 2024 which claimed at least 232 lives. King Felipe visited one of the reception centres for evacuees from the affected zone, where he spoke with people spending their second or third night sleeping in sports centres. “Some have had a very bad time, some have been away from their homes for four days now, some have lost many possessions. Collectively, we have lost an incalculable amount of natural heri- tage,” the king told reporters. Supermarket looks to UK salad growers to fill shelves
Charlotte Reck
Sainsbury’s is to increase supplies of British tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers amid fears of drought affecting crops imported from abroad. The UK’s second biggest super- market has signed new ten-year part- nerships with the UK producers Eve- sham Vale Growers and Thanet Earth to guarantee a steady supply. Severe weather has badly affected the produce in the past, hindering transportation and forcing grocery suppliers to take action to avoid pro- duct scarcity. Sainsbury’s said British-grown toma- toes, peppers and cucumbers were already an important part of its salad range but extreme weather across warmer growing regions had under- lined the need for supermarkets to build more resilient supply chains.
King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia
visited reception centres for evacuees
Active wildfires Source: Nasa Firms
M A D R I D Ávila
10 miles
It hopes its long-term agreement with Thanet Earth will extend availa- bility of British cucumbers beyond the summer season into the winter months for the first time, after traditionally relying more heavily on imports. The new British winter crop will be grown at Thanet Earth in Kent, the UK’s largest single-site glasshouse complex. Benefits of the agreements will be on shelves as early as this summer with the launch of the new Taste the Difference British Salad Selection 800g box. Hannah O’Reilly, category director of produce at Sainsbury’s, said: “Invest- ing in more British production and sup- porting our suppliers to innovate is helping us build a stronger, more resil- ient supply chain.” Rob James, technical director at Thanet Earth, said: “Working with Sainsbury’s in this way means we can plan ahead with more certainty.”
Monday July 27 2026 | the times News
Songbirds Vocal harmony trio The Knightingales joined more than a thousand re-enactors at the Suffolk Military Show at Trinity Park, Ipswich, over the weekend
life expectancy worsens
Poppy Koronka Health Correspondent
Poppy Koronka
ancy has worsened in the past decade, as Londoners live three years longer on average than people in the northeast, research has found. Life expectancy in England last year was the highest recorded, but the gains were not shared equally across the country. Almost half of the population in the north saw no improvement in their life expectancy in the last decade, consist- ently ranking among the lowest in the country, according to the analysis from the King’s Fund. In London, the east, southeast and southwest, longevity increased, despite London seeing the largest decrease during the pandemic. Those living in the most deprived 30 per cent of the country experienced a fall or saw no improvement in their life expectancy in the decade to 2022-24. Veena Raleigh, senior fellow at the King’s Fund, said: “That people in our northern and deprived com- munities have seen little or no im- provement in longevity over a decade, in contrast to the health gains in their southern and more well-off counter- parts, is a mark of shame for an affluent country. Addressing this inequity in the nation’s health is not just a matter of social justice, it would reduce pres- sures on the NHS and the high eco- nomic costs of ill health. “Improving population health and reducing entrenched health inequal- ities have never been more urgent and yet also more challenging, given the economic constraints facing the coun-
North East
England life expectancy
London South East South West East of England
East Midlands West Midlands North West
Females 85
2011-13 2017-19 2017-19 2023-25 Source: ONS (2025, OHID (2026)
cross-governmental action to reduce
largely preventable illnesses such as
cardiovascular disease and diabetes
associated with poor diet, drinking and
smoking, and tackle the wider determi-
nants driving persistent poor health, es-
pecially among northern and deprived
communities.”
Healthy life expectancy — the
number of years a person can expect to
live in good health — fell by about
2.5 years. People in affluent areas lived
on average for six to seven years longer
in good health than those in deprived
areas.
Figures show that in 2022-24, men
living in the least deprived 10 per cent of
areas in England could expect to live
about a decade longer overall than men
in the 10 per cent most deprived areas.
For women the difference was eight
years.
However, the gap in healthy life
expectancy was even greater at two
decades. This means that people in the
most deprived areas not only have
Yorkshire & the Humber
Males 81
2011-13 2023-25
their lives in poor health. A close examination of people in London compared with those in the northeast showed northerners fare badly in the number of early deaths from heart disease and cancer, as well as suicide and deaths linked to alcohol and drug misuse. Life expectancy in England is lowest of all comparable high-income coun- tries, apart from Germany and the US. The Department of Health and Social Care said: “Someone’s postcode should never dictate how long they live, and this government is determined to tackle the stark inequalities that still exist across Britain. “We’re already taking action, from allocating GP funding more fairly to delivering pioneering neighbourhood health centres in the areas that need them most. But we will now go further in devolving power to local communi- ties, putting decision-making into the hands of those who know their areas best, and driving lasting change.”
after exam mistake let them work
Physicians for “professional negli- gence” after they were mistakenly told that they had passed a key exam. The 21 doctors have started legal action against the college after “human error” meant that hundreds of doctors who sat part two of the Membership of Royal Colleges of Physicians written exam in September 2023 were errone- ously informed that they had passed. Many of the doctors worked for more than a year without being aware that they were not qualified to do so. Those affected by the error “suffered immedi- ate career uncertainty, professional embarrassment and emotional distress, health consequences and financial consequences”, accord to the “Letter of Claim” seen by the Sunday Telegraph. Of the 1,451 who took the test, 61 were mistakenly told that they had failed when they had passed, while 222 were told that they had passed when they had failed. The mistake only came to light 18 months later, in February 2025, after a second, unrelated examination error triggered an audit of past results. The Times has asked the RCP for comment. The Federation of the Royal Colleges of Physicians of the UK con- firmed the legal claim and said: “It would, therefore, be inappropriate for us to comment on this specifically while the case is ongoing. The seriousness of this incident is recognised, and the three colleges and the federation expressed their apologies for the distress and disruption it caused.”
® No 2630
Quintagram
Solve all five concise clues using
each letter underneath once only
1 Paddy field grain (4)
2 River of western Germany (5)
3 Part of an egg (5)
4 Scintillating, glittering (9)
5 Strengthened for defence (9)
A C D E E E E F
F G H H I I I I
I I K L N N O P
R R R R S T T W
Solutions see T2 MindGames p15
Cryptic clues T2 MindGames p14
Migrant dinghy charge
boat Channel crossing allegedly transported a record 165 migrants from France to England in a 13m “mega dinghy”. Chan Mathok Atak, 19, from South Sudan, is accused of endangering another during Thursday’s crossing to Dover. He was remanded in custody and will appear at Margate magistrates’ court today.
Four die in car crash
suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving after his car crashed into trees, killing four passengers, all from Leeds. The accident was near the A50 in Derby on Saturday. Two women, aged 18 and 30, and a man, 36, died at the scene. A baby girl died in hospital. The driver, 33, is being treated for serious injuries.
Paramedic struck off
after he filmed a woman undressing in a swimming pool changing cubicle then claimed his baby had picked up his phone and recorded the footage. Benjamin Southam was convicted of voyeurism at Ipswich crown court in June last year. He has now been removed from the paramedics register.
Back garden Tardis
spent more than £30,000 building a full-size replica of the 1983 Tardis console room in his back garden. Brendan Sheppard, 49, and a team of craftsmen took two years to recreate the Time Lord’s control room, including flashing lights and towering time rotor, in a studio outside his home in South Kyme, Lincolnshire.
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Jessica Sharkey Crime Correspondent
tions involving child offenders led to custodial sentences last year, according to official figures. Data from the Youth Justice Board showed that 19 out of the 86 proven rape offences committed by children aged ten to 17 in 2025 resulted in custo- dy, accounting for 22 per cent of cases. Over the past five years young
growing cast in tragedy of Mango tycoon
fatal plunge features a suspected son, a healer and a British translator, David Sharrock reports from Montserrat
Montserrat
breaks the silence on the pilgrim trail to Montserrat monastery, the Benedict- ine sanctuary revered as Catalonia’s spiritual and national symbol. It’s hard to imagine what took place up here on the Camí de les Feixades in December 2024 when Isak Andic, the 71-year-old bil- lionaire founder of the Mango fashion empire, fell to his death on a hike with his son, Jona- than, 45. On a hot morning in mid-July, when the fear of wildfires is high across the Spanish countryside, there are no hikers on a route where jagged peaks give way to precipitous ra- vines. The holy mountain has long drawn pilgrims seeking spiritual solace and the path to the top is rated easy, mostly pro- tected by a low single metal bar. Jonathan Andic told emergency workers two years ago that his father had fallen, despite the modest protections. “I need help,” he said. “I think he’s fallen
offences. Separate data from the board, obtained through a freedom of infor- mation request, showed that there were 314 proven sexual offences committed by ten to 17-year-olds last year, up by 38 per cent from the 227 committed in 2021. The vast majority of the offenders were boys aged between 15 and 17. Referral orders, a community sen- tence for first-time offenders, were the
His father, Catalonia’s richest man, tumbled 100 metres to his death prompting grief and shock across Spain and, in particular, among Catalan high society. Isak, who emigrated from Turkey, was a popular figure and a gen- erous host who only weeks before his death had welcomed top chefs includ- ing Ferran Adrià to his home, where they had drunk the finest wines from his famous cellar, an acquaintance told The Times this week. For a long time it seemed an open- and-shut case. Then, in a scandal that has rocked one of Europe’s wealthi- est families, Jonathan was arrested on suspicion of pushing his father to his death. He is the eldest of three sib- lings and, until his arrest in May, was vice-chairman of the board at Mango, the company his father built from a single Barcelona store in 1984 into a global retailer with about 2,900 stores across 120 markets and revenues approach- ing €3.8 billion. The Catalan police, the Mossos d’Esquadra, ini- tially accepted the accidental fall theory, closing the case in Janu- ary 2025. Yet from the very first day there were doubts about the circumstances of the death. Within weeks a case was re- opened. Detectives were troubled by fundamental contradic- tions in Jonathan’s testimony. In one statement, he was metres
Isak Andic with
Kate Moss in
2011 and, left,
monastery and
the mountain
where he fell to
his death in
Jonathan, far
right, is under
investigation.
Below: the
therapist Maria
Julia Lüderwaldt
by youth rehabilitation orders. An analysis of government data by the Youth Endowment Fund this month found that the number of child- ren arrested for sexual offences reached a ten-year high of 3,809 last year. Meanwhile, the number of children cautioned or convicted for indecent image offences, including the taking, possession or distribution of sexual
he saw his father fall while screaming. The judge’s subsequent writ noted that these accounts were “incompatible between themselves”. The fall has exposed deep divisions within the family in the months before Isak’s death as he planned to restruc- ture his €4.5 billion fortune into a charitable foundation. The autopsy revealed no instinctive braking wounds on his hands. Injuries suggested he fell feet-first “as if launched down a slide”. A skid mark at the cliff’s edge appeared, to mountain police, not the sort left by an accidental slip. At the centre of the Andic case is Maria Julia Lüderwaldt, an unregis- tered psychotherapist originally from Ecuador, who acted as a friend, confi- dante and therapist to many of the Spanish elite, treating everyone from the Sánchez Vicario tennis clan to Iñaki Urdangarin, the disgraced former son- in-law of the Spanish king, according to reports. The Andics began therapy with her in 2023, at the suggestion of Estefa- nia Knuth, Isak’s partner, who hoped to reconcile father and son. But Lüder- waldt appears to have taken Jonathan’s side in the financial dispute, according to prosecutors, even warning Isak that she would withdraw from treating the family unless he granted his son a €40 million advance on his inheritance.
cent over the past decade. Two 15-year-old boys were sen- tenced to four years’ detention this month for the rape of two girls in Ford- ingbridge, Hampshire after the Court of Appeal ruled that their original, non- custodial, sentences were unduly lenient. The victims, then aged 14 and 15, were raped in separate incidents in November 2024 and January last year by the boys, known as X and Y. A third
JULIEN M. HEKIMIAN/GETTY IMAGES
with Lüderwaldt’s approach, though the defence insists the €40 million was never paid; instead, Jonathan received €2 million, with each of his sisters re- ceiving €1 million, amounts later offset in Isak’s will. Lüderwaldt’s unorthodox methods now appear relevant to the inquiry. Judge Raquel Nieto Galvan has ordered the police to investigate whether “a third person” might have been involved in the death, directly or indirectly. Earlier this week another character entered the story: Lüderwaldt’s some- time assistant, a British interpreter identified as Jo. According to Barcelo- na’s La Vanguardia newspaper, she was asked to find a suitable walking route for Jonathan as part of an unconven- tional therapeutic exercise and selected the trail in the Montserrat massif. Jo accompanied Jonathan there on December 7, 2024, a week before his father’s death. Lüderwaldt’s assistant, who also acts as her interpreter, was born in Britain but lives in Barcelona. She gave two voluntary statements to the police after, she said, more than a year of sleepless nights because of what she knew. She has not been named. Jonathan Andic maintains that his father’s death was an accident. Jo is un- derstood to have told police that Lüder- waldt instructed the son to place him-
aging and filming the second attack. In May the teenagers were spared custody for a combined ten charges of rape and seven indecent image offen- ces at Southampton crown court, instead receiving youth rehabilitation orders, a community-based sentence. The case led to public outcry from the families of the victims and from across the political spectrum. Sir Keir Starmer called the case “distressing”.
tion”, describing an exercise in which he should stand “at the edge of a cliff”. Ac- cording to her, Lüderwaldt regarded the exercise as a literal expression of the psychoanalytic concept of the “death of the father”, intended to help Jonathan free himself from what the therapist be- lieved was an unhealthy emotional de- pendence. Prosecutors have not accused Lüder- waldt of any offence or placed her under investigation, and there is no suggestion that the alleged exercise was intended to cause physical harm. The assistant has given the police messages exchanged with Lüderwaldt. In one, sent after news of Andic’s death, she asked the therapist what had hap- pened. Lüderwaldt allegedly replied: “Maybe it’s better if I don’t know other- wise I might be next.” “You don’t protest, but you leave there in tears and feeling guilty,” one of Lüderwaldt’s patients told El Pais. “She didn’t charge much, but you end up going more often, and the whole family goes. I went from one day a week to three.” The 58-year-old added: “When- ever I faced a problem, I’d ring her and say: ‘What should I do?’” The case has laid bare the brutal arithmetic of great wealth. Isak’s will di- vided most of his fortune equally among his three children, leaving €5 million to Knuth. She deemed this insultingly inadequate and demanded €70 million. Just weeks before Jona- than’s arrest, the siblings agreed to pay her a €27 million settlement. Jonathan’s sisters, Judith and Sarah, have defended their brother and say they plan to create the Isak Andic Foundation themselves. The judge has ordered a forensic re- construction of the fatal fall, and de- tectives are analysing Jonathan’s com- munications during a trip to Ecuador, where a previous mobile phone dis- appeared in “strange circumstances”. What happened on that Saturday morning in December 2024 may never be known with certainty. There were no witnesses beyond Jonathan himself. The case rests, as the judge acknowl- edges, on a “cumulus of indications”— circumstantial evidence that, woven to- gether, might suggest premeditation and malice, but does not conclusively prove them. In one message, Jonathan wrote to his father: “I’m not surprised you thought I was capable of killing you.” The same message ended, his defence notes, with: “I hope you enjoy this sum- mer. Sending you lots of kisses.” For the Andic dynasty, the fall from grace continues.
by cuts not taxes, Badenoch insists
Geraldine Scott
Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor packages announced for bus passen- gers, energy billpayers and pub-goers. The Resolution Foundation has esti- mated last week’s pledges will cost more than £2 billion in 2029-30. Burn- ham has told his cabinet to find cuts as the commitments mount. Government sources said he had already committed to honouring La- bour’s manifesto pledge to not raise in- come tax, national insurance or VAT. Burnham is understood to believe the issue of how social care works and is funded in England has been neglected by previous administrations. A No 10 source said: “Andy is going to run towards problems that have been neglected, giving people hope again. “He has the courage to fix the most difficult issues that have been ignored for years and seen as impossible to re- solve. He doesn’t accept that they are. They can’t be ignored any longer.” Badenoch said social care was “a hugely important issue for so many people and one that matters a lot to me”. She said attempts to form a “durable consensus” had failed, but she was happy to work with the prime minister as long as her red lines were not breached. Badenoch said “any solution to the issues around social care must al- so be fair to those who have made provi- sions and saved up over the course of their lives” and that the money needed to be found through cuts. She added: “I hope we can find common ground on this and I look forward to working with you on this vital issue.” Casey, who is leading the commis- sion on adult social care, is poised to launch a national conversation on how the system should be funded. Streeting admitted the review he commissioned
Geraldine Scott
Kemi Badenoch will only support Andy Burnham’s social care reforms if they are funded by cutting spending rather than raising taxes, The Times can reveal. In a letter to the prime minister, sent before an expected announcement this week, the Conservative leader offered to work with the government and other parties on social care, but set out two “core principles” for a deal. She said that over the course of this parliament, Labour was planning to borrow more than a quarter of a trillion pounds more than the plans it inherit- ed, as debt is forecast to rise every year. She warned Burnham against increasing taxes to fund his early announcements. She said: “The tax burden has risen to a record high under Labour, and there is already specula- tion you will increase taxes further at the budget this autumn in order to pay for all the things you have announced in your first week, plus the outstanding gaps in funding for the defence invest- ment plan.” On social care she said: “The money must be found by reducing current spending. You must rule out any tax rises or increased borrowing which will ultimately fall on the next generation.” Burnham will give a speech on social care this week and believes it is an ur- gent issue. Wes Streeting, the defence secretary, suggested yesterday that a review being carried out by Baroness Casey of Black- stock could be brought forward to re- port earlier. Burnham and John Healey, the chancellor, are under pressure to explain how they will sustain support
The Liberal Democrats have been accused of softening their position on women’s rights after accepting hundreds of thousands of pounds from one of Britain’s biggest financial backers of transgender causes. Sex Matters, the campaign group, said that the timing of a series of policy interventions by Sir Ed Davey and senior Liberal Democrats raised ques- tions about whether the party’s posi- tion had shifted after donations from Simon Ruddick, a financier who has publicly described support for trans communities as a priority. Electoral Commission records show that Ruddick has donated more than £200,000 to the party this year. In an inter- view published by the LGBT charity GiveOut, he said that he had cho- sen to support trans- gender people because they were a “tiny and dispropor- tionately oppressed” community whose rights were under attack. The Equality and
Human Rights Commission’s (EHRC) code of practice, laid before parliament in May, gives guidance after the Su- preme Court’s ruling in April last year that sex in the Equality Act 2010 refers to biological sex. It says that a service must be provided on the basis of biolog- ical sex to qualify as single-sex under the act, meaning trans women should not be admitted to women’s toilets, changing rooms and other female-only facilities. Helen Joyce, director of advocacy at Sex Matters, said: “The Liberal Dem- ocrats have retreated noticeably on sex-based rights in recent months, to the point where most of its MPs have signed the legally illiterate early day motion on the EHRC code of practice. Its timing is re- markably aligned with donations from someone who has a signifi- cant personal in- terest in trans ac- tivism.” Davey and Marie Goldman, the party’s
as health secretary had been “set up to take too long”. Burnham has said the system should “operate on the NHS principle” and be free at the point of need, a move projected to cost £18.5 billion a year. The Times reported on Friday that the “universal” offer was unlikely to cover the daily living costs of a care home, such as laundry, food, accommodation and energy bills, meaning residents could still face bills of tens of thousands of pounds a year. Burnham has pursued a national care service since 2010, when he wrote a white paper as health secretary pro- posing free care for all. However Con- servative claims of a “death tax” helped kill his proposals before the election. Sir Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat leader, said he hoped “the prime minis- ter’s door will be open so we can finally get this right together”. Burnham is also expected to tackle youth unemployment and devolution in the coming days, the latter involving handing mayors a share of income tax revenue to spend on their cities. The government is actively weighing options to replace council tax and stamp duty, it was reported yesterday. Treasury officials had begun mapping out an overhaul of property tax before Burnham entered No 10 so the incom- ing administration could be briefed, ac- cording to the i Paper. Steve Reed, in his final appearance before a Commons se- lect committee as housing secretary, confirmed that officials were examin- ing reform options for both taxes.
women and equalities spokeswoman, wrote to Bridget Phillipson, the minis- ter for women and equalities, last month urging her to withdraw the code. At the time Liberal Voice for Women, the Liberal Democrat women’s rights group, said that the leadership had “ac- tively chosen to ignore” women who re- ly on single-sex spaces. Baroness Ludford, a Liberal Demo- crat peer, said that she was “upset and bewildered” that Davey had put his name to the letter having previously ac- cepted the Supreme Court judgment. Ruddick said he had been a supporter of the Lib Dems since working for the party in 1979 and he “chose to donate to the party again because I support its aims and values”. He added: “I particu- larly admire the party standing by the trans community under Ed Davey’s leadership. I have had absolutely no in- put into Liberal Democrat policy and I have never expected to.” The Liberal Democrats said that con- cerns about the EHRC code of practice have nothing to do with any donations. “Lots of people choose to support the Liberal Democrats to further our values and vision for the country, and we are proud that our party policy is de- cided by our members democratically at our conferences,” the party said.
Andy Burnham on a No 10 North chair featuring Manchester’s unofficial motto
trans group, says ex-adviser
Ministers should consider proscribing a militant transgender activist group which has targeted the offices of MPs, the government’s former adviser on political violence has said. Writing in The Times, Lord Walney said the conduct of the group Bash Back “deserves far more serious attention than it has so far received” and that ministers should test it against the same threshold that led to the proscription of Palestine Action. The transgender-led direct action group vandalised the office of Wes Streeting in July last year when he was the health secretary, and has pushed for a “new era of trans rage”. The Times previously revealed that the group had produced a guide for members urging them to arm them- selves and carry out repeated illegal attacks. It told activists to form “independent local cells”, “identify a target” — includ- ing MPs, organisations and political party conferences — and “ensure your target can be hit repeatedly until they desist” from their “transphobic” activi-
ties. “On the evidence already in the public domain, there is a serious case to answer,” Walney said. It comes after a court heard this week that Ann Widdecombe was struck 21 times on the head with a hammer. Walney stressed that he made no suggestion about who was responsible while proceedings were active, but said it was “a fair observation” that Bash Back had withdrawn none of its ma- terial since her death. “Not one image of masked, hammer- wielding activists. Not the guide in- structing supporters to select political targets and strike them until they de- sist,” he said. This week Bash Back pledged to “re- sist” Andy Burnham’s administration and claimed that he had appointed “bigots and authoritarians” to his top team. They cited Streeting, Yvette Cooper, Shabana Mahmood and Bridg- et Phillipson. The group has said that it is non-vio- lent and tells activists not to harm people. However, the guide set out tactics for what it described as direct action, ad- mitting that it would be “rarely legal”
I
— from the Tony Wilson biopic 24 Hour Party People. Laura Kuenssberg was shown a Smiths gold disc on his office wall
and warned participants that they could face charges including criminal damage, possession of an offensive weapon and aggravated trespass. The document also included practical ad- vice on carrying out attacks and how to escape detection afterwards. An equipment section listed items such as a hammer and advised activists to clean tools with alcohol or dispose of them after use “in unsurveilled residen- tial bins”. Walney argued that political vio- lence “does not begin with an assault” but with “the creation of an atmosphere in which intimidation is normalised, opponents are dehumanised and sup- porters are encouraged to believe that extreme measures are justified”. The group previously claimed re- sponsibility for an attack that forced the Equality and Human Rights Commis- sion out of its Vauxhall offices. This month Zia Yusuf, Reform UK’s home affairs spokesman, said the most seri- ous current threat to Sarah Pochin, the party’s MP for Runcorn and Helsby, came from the group. Bash Back said that this was untrue. The group was contacted for comment. The Home Office said: “While the right to protest is fundamental to our democracy, this cannot cross the line into intimidation, unlawful or violent behaviour. “Those doing so will face the full force of the law.”
Comment
f Palestine Action showed us anything, it is that governments cannot afford to wait until direct action movements become entrenched before acting. For years we have heard the familiar refrain from militant activists that they are “non-violent”. Those words ring hollow when set against their rhetoric, imagery and tactics. Political violence does not begin with an assault. It begins with the creation of an atmosphere in which intimidation is normalised, opponents are dehumanised and supporters are encouraged to believe that extreme measures are justified. That is why the conduct of the militant transgender activist group Bash Back deserves far more serious attention than it has so far received. This week a court was told that Ann Widdecombe was struck 21 times on the head with a hammer. Nobody should prejudge proceedings that are active, and I
make no suggestion here about who was responsible or why. However, it is a fair observation about Bash Back that in the days since her death, the group has withdrawn nothing. Not one image of masked, hammer-wielding activists. Not the guide instructing supporters to select political targets and strike them until they desist. An organisation genuinely committed to non-violence, watching the country absorb the killing of a public figure in her own home, would have paused. This one did not. The lesson from Palestine Action should be obvious. It took the British state five years to act against an organisation whose campaign escalated from criminal damage to sustained attacks on sites central to Britain’s defence. Along the way workers were intimidated for doing their jobs, and Sergeant Kate Evans suffered a fractured spine after being struck twice with a sledgehammer during a raid on Elbit Systems in Bristol. The activist responsible was jailed for seven years and eight months for grievous bodily harm with intent. It was only after military aircraft
Compulsory voting in the mix — with £10 fines for the apathetic
Geraldine Scott pulsory “duty to vote”, enforced with a £10 fine. The proposals would have allowed voters to abstain and exempted those unable to participate because of illness, disability, absence from the country or conscientious or religious beliefs. The Campaign for Compulsory Voting, set up in the past year, has also been working with MPs and peers be- hind the scenes to support changes to the Representation of the People Bill. Charles White, from the group, said: “People in politics, across the party spectrum, are increasingly vocal in their concerns about low turnout at elections. Britain’s unequal electorate has resulted in economic failure being rewarded for decades. It has led many people to feel a sense of alienation from decision making, reinforcing a cyni- cism with politics.” A separate amendment tabled by Bell Ribeiro-Addy and supported by MPs from Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens called for compulsory voting to be accompanied by a pro- gramme of civic education. Polling for the Constitution Society by YouGov last April found the public backed compulsory voting by 48 per cent to 42, with only a fifth strongly opposed. Burnham has been clear that he is prepared to reopen the question of how Britain elects its governments. Nick Garland, the lead author of the IPPR report, said politicians were en- couraged to prioritise the interests of groups most likely to vote, creating a “vicious circle” of disengagement. Turnout at the 2024 election stood at 56 per cent among those aged 18 to 24, compared with 81 per cent among people aged 61 and over. There was also a 20 percentage-point gap between graduates and those with the fewest qualifications. “A change to a more proportional voting system is crucial, but Australia- style compulsory voting should be part of that mix,” Garland said.
Voting would be compulsory under proposals seen by some of Andy Burnham’s most senior advisers, with suggestions those who stay at home be hit with a £10 fine. MPs have already attempted to insert compulsory voting into legis- lation inherited by the new govern- ment, while three think tanks influen- tial in Labour policy circles advocated the change. The prime minister is known to be in- terested in electoral reform, and has pledged to make the case for it to be in- cluded in the next Labour manifesto. While it is understood compulsory voting does not form part of that plan at present, proposals were seen by mem- bers of Burnham’s transition team before he entered Downing Street, while papers advocating the policy were produced or approved by people who have taken senior roles in No 10. Think Labour, the organisation pre- viously known as Labour Together, published a paper advocating compul- sory voting before the Labour leader- ship contest. It was signed off by Alison Phillips, who has since become Burn- ham’s deputy chief of staff. Demos separately urged the new prime minister to adopt the policy with- in his first 100 days. A third intervention came from the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR), a think tank close to Labour, which published proposals for a £10 fine and a “none of the above” option on ballot papers on July 10. The report is understood to have been seen by members of Burnham’s transition team, while at least two offi- cials now working in No 10 were familiar with it from their time at IPPR. Labour MPs have also backed the change. An amendment to the Repre- sentation of the People Bill tabled by Antonia Bance, the MP for Tipton and Wednesbury, would have required ministers to draw up plans for a com-
at RAF Brize Norton were sprayed that the government concluded enough was enough. In June the Court of Appeal upheld that decision, finding that Palestine Action was not the transparent, non- violent protest group it claimed to be but a covert organisation whose operations were planned to avoid detection. We should not make the same mistake twice. Bash Back has openly embraced many of the methods that made Palestine Action so disruptive. Its guide concedes that its tactics will be “rarely legal”, and urges activists to form independent local cells, identify a target and ensure it can be hit repeatedly until it desists. It also offers practical advice on carrying out attacks and evading detection. MPs and public bodies have already been targeted. The Equality and Human Rights Commission was forced out of its Vauxhall headquarters after an attack on the building. Bash Back claimed responsibility for that vandalism. The group also claimed responsibility for vandalising Wes Streeting’s constituency office last year, when the words “child killer” were sprayed across its windows. Its
guide uses a photograph of that same office as an example of a suitable target. And at a press conference this month, Zia Yusuf, of Reform UK, claimed the most serious current threat to Sarah Pochin, the party’s MP for Runcorn & Helsby, comes from Bash Back. Peaceful protest is a fundamental liberty. Campaigning, lobbying and vigorous disagreement are all legitimate. Organised intimidation is not. The government has rightly concluded that systematic criminal disruption can, in some circumstances, justify the exceptional step of proscription. Ministers should now test Bash Back against that same threshold. On the evidence already in the public domain, there is a serious case to answer. The cost of delay is well understood. We cannot afford to wait another five years to decide enough is enough. It is time for the government to act against those who have crossed the line from protest into coercion, before it is too late. Lord Walney is the government’s former independent adviser on political violence and disruption
a spectacle of Meta AI glasses
Ellie McDonald
Spoof advertisements featuring the paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein wearing Meta’s AI glasses have been installed at bus stops across London in a guerrilla campaign protesting against privacy risks. The activist group Everyone Hates Elon appeared at a bus stop on Carne- gie Street with an image of Epstein accompanied by the slogan: “Glasses for people who don’t do consent.” A separate poster near Meta’s London headquarters in King’s Cross featured a celebrity wearing an oval- framed design of the smart eyewear that has a camera in the frame. The advert uses an optical illusion: from a distance it appears indistinguishable from a legitimate promotional image, but as pedestrians approach, the celeb- rity’s face turns skeletal and the text shifts from “Meta AI glasses” to read: “Meta: We’re always watching.” Last year Everyone Hates Elon pro- duced a poster that called a Tesla the “Swasticar”, featuring an image of Elon Musk appearing to mimic a Nazi salute at Donald Trump’s inauguration. In response to the allegations, Musk,
Epstein wearing
the chief executive of SpaceX and Tesla, posted on X: “Frankly, they need better dirty tricks. The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is sooo tired.” In February the activists installed a sign near the Sandringham Estate tar- geting Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor as there was pressure on him to assist the US Department of Justice over his ties to Epstein. Jane, a spokeswoman for the group, said the Meta glasses were vulnerable to exploitation. She said: “These glasses will make it easy to record women and children without their knowledge. There’s been reports that future ver- sions won’t even have the red light that will show people that you’re recording. “These glasses feel like they’re making perverts’ and abusers’ lives easier when we should actually be making women’s lives easier. They are pervert glasses. We wanted to use Jeffrey Epstein to highlight who these glasses will be used by, and it’s powerful men and abusers.” The Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, which cost £247 to £459, feature a 12- megapixel ultra-wide camera capable of capturing high-resolution photos and 3K video, alongside discreet micro-
smart glasses
phones and open-ear audio. They can stream to Instagram and Facebook. The protest coincides with reports that Meta is planning to test a prototype of “super-sensing” AI glasses. According to the Financial Times, the devices would continuously capture a wearer’s surroundings through camera and audio
recordings, allowing an AI assistant to recall details of the user’s day or respond to queries about what they have seen. Although Meta’s present smart glass- es feature an LED in the corner of the frame to signal when the wearer is re- cording, executives are planning not to activate the light when the proposed
bus stop in London
featuring Jeffrey
super-sensing features are in use, according to reports. There have been reports of women being filmed in London without their consent. In some instances the video has been shared on social media. Jane said: “For young people nowa- days, they’ve not lived in a world where you can’t just be filmed everywhere you go. But now, you just have no right to privacy. No one is consenting to being filmed, and it feels like that right to con- sent has been taken away.” In an Instagram post this week, Leon- ardo Maria Del Vecchio, the president and chief strategy officer at Ray-Ban’s parent company, EssilorLuxottica, shared an image of one of the spoof ads featuring the phrase: “the biggest ad- vance in pervert technology since the trenchcoat”, accompanied by a laughing emoji. He later wrote: “If we can’t laugh about it, why should anyone trust us?” Meta said: “We’ve built privacy into the camera for the glasses from the ground up — a capture LED will blink bright white when you take a photo or video you can save or share. This light has no off switch, so both people wear- ing the glasses and those around them feel comfortable.” Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, said: “We now actually have the glasses basically stop working if you drill that light out, because we saw that people were trying to drill it out. Plus, if you’re posting content that is taking advantage of people and harassing them ... then we’re going to take the content down.” EssilorLuxottica was approached for comment.
Consumer Affairs Correspondent rose said that sales of cottage pie had risen by 110 per cent over the past month compared with the same period last year and that demand for chicken and ham gratin was up 68 per cent. Sales of chicken korma and rice had also increased by 67 per cent while demand for chicken, bacon and leek pie climbed by 41 per cent. Even the accepted summer practice of drinking something cold, pale and preferably containing a slice of citrus appears to be under threat. Sales of fine South African red wine rose by 68 per cent over the same period. Waitrose has described the phenom- enon as “reverse comfort eating”, the
Andrew Ellson
There are many established ways to survive a heatwave: shut the curtains, commandeer the office fan and complain that other countries are “better set up for this sort of thing”. Britons have now discovered another. Put a cottage pie in the oven, open a bottle of red wine and pretend it is November. Despite recent high temperatures, shoppers appear to be tiring of feta, watermelon and salad and are return- ing instead to the reassuring embrace of pastry, gravy and melted cheese. Wait-
Lively with a perfect finish ... runners wine down after 5km
Alisha Agarwal
Calves burning and fatigue beginning to set in, this was usually the part of a run where I would have to remind myself why I thought a 5K was a good idea in the first place. Ahead, a glimmer of hope. The sign of Reigate’s local winery, Basil’s, is straight ahead. Welcome to Run to Wine, a club dedicated to combining running with wine tasting. Hosted by Katie Brook, a qualified wine expert and ultra-runner, the club provides a space for wine-lovers and runners to connect on low-pressure runs around the UK. “I have this fun theory that wine and running are the same kind of thing,” Brook said. “You go on a date, have a couple glasses of wine, you let your guard down and you start talking about things a little more in depth. When you go for a run your barrier drops in exactly the same way.” I was eager to test out the theory first-hand. I joined the club on a balmy evening, hoping that my moderate running experience would get me through to the part I was looking forward to the most: a five-part wine tasting, accompanied by focaccia and charcuterie. While I can do a gentle 5km in my local park, I knew that Reigate, Surrey, would be different terrain to the flat paths and cool breeze of the Thames that usually spurred me on. Brook explained that we would be run- ning through the high street, turning onto horse fields, tackling an “easy hill”, before ending back at the winery. Brook would be leading the group and pacers would follow at the tail. After a quick head count, and ensuring that watches were switched on and Strava, the exercise tracking app, started, we made our way down Reigate high street. I started upfront with Brook, letting her take the lead with conversation. She explained: “I got into running about ten years ago when I moved to London. I signed up for Never Stop London’s trail run. I was a complete novice. “At the pub after, everyone started talking about trail running and ultras, running 100 kilometres, 100 miles! I was like, ‘What is this? What do you eat, drink? Where do you go to the loo?’ ”
Ultra-runs are what she calls “picnic running”. She said: “You have to fuel yourself. At every aid station there’s watermelon, squares, bars, salty pota- toes! There’s a charcuterie cheese board in Italy. It is literally like a picnic.” And wherever there’s a charcuterie board, there’s sure to be a glass of wine. I asked her if she had ever reversed the concept. A wine-tasting before the run, or even a wine-crawl? “I’ve had a few people turn up early and have a glass of wine before the run,” Brook said, “But, the amount of people that sent me Tom Gilbey’s reel when he
rejection of refreshing summer dishes in favour of food usually associated with dark evenings and woollen socks. The underlying idea that people may seek familiar, emotionally reassuring food regardless of the weather is supported by a broader understanding of how comfort eating works. Our attachment to particular dishes is shaped not only by hunger but by habit, memory and culture. Across much of the world, eating steaming or spicy food in intense heat is not considered eccentric at all. Pho is eaten in Vietnam, hot broths are popular during Korean summers and spicy dishes remain staples in Mexico.
Enjoying a wine tasting at Basil’s after a run through Reigate high street, fields
and an “easy hill”. The club is a space for wine lovers and runners to connect
did the marathon and tasted wine, we’ve definitely got to do that as well.” Gilbey, 54, a wine connoisseur, went viral in 2024 for sampling 25 wines during the London Marathon, raising more than £14,000 for charity. Jenny Starr, the pacer of today’s run, spoke of the motivation that a glass of wine gave her: “It’s so fun. I like trying to get my fitness up, but I also love wine.” Earlier this month The Times report- ed that the average speed of runners in the UK has steadily decreased since the pandemic, according to Strava. The average time it takes to cover 5km has increased to 29 minutes for men and 38 minutes for women. According to Strava, 13 per cent of runs recorded on the app are 5km in distance. Finding myself now near the middle of the pack, I tried to decipher the split between runners and wine-lovers before falling into step with Roxanne D’Souza who was “equally” into both. When I asked her why she joined Run to Wine, she said: “It’s quite fun to
Hearty fare is replacing lighter dishes
In parts of China, hot water is drunk throughout the year. Such habits suggest that the British rulebook divid- ing food into “summer” and “winter” categories is far from universal. There may also be a physiological
know that at the end of the run you’ve got a little prize waiting for you.” We turned the corner and the winery was in sight. It had taken me a modest 33 minutes and 57 seconds. I logged it into Strava before scrolling through my camera roll to attach a sweaty picture of me with a glass of wine that was now in hand. Brook talked through each wine in detail. She started with the Villiera Cap Classique brut, a sparkling wine from South Africa where she had studied wine. This was followed by Tread Softly’s pinot grigio, a soave, a rosé Cap Amunt, before ending on a Vins Oblidats Negre 2024. My runner’s high combined with the slight buzz of alcohol and camaraderie perfectly epitomised the experience of Run to Wine. My fellow runners agreed. “In some of the run clubs every- body’s in perfect shape and they’re all athletes,” D’Souza noted. “Whereas this one had a sense of community and that’s what’s kept me coming back.”
advantage to turning up the tempera- ture. Hot or spicy food activates recep- tors in the mouth and can encourage the body to sweat. Provided that the sweat evaporates, an important qualifi- cation on a humid afternoon, that evap- oration removes heat from the skin. Research also suggests that people drinking warm water before exercise lose more body heat than those drinking cold water. Reverse comfort eating may have a limit. A pie can provide nostalgia, familiarity and possibly even emotional restoration. It cannot prevent the person cooking it from spending the evening beside an oven set to 200C.
food window may cut risk of dementia
Kaya Burgess Science Correspondent
Restricting your eating to a nine-hour window each day — and stopping all consumption four hours before you go to bed — could be linked with a reduced risk of developing dementia for over- weight women, researchers have said. Results from a small randomised clinical trial were presented yesterday to the annual meeting of the American Society of Nutrition in Maryland, look- ing at whether “time-restricted eating”, a form of intermittent fasting, could have any impact on dementia risk. Losing weight by any healthy means has been linked with lower rates of neurodegenerative decline in later life, but doing so by eating only within certain windows each day may provide an extra boost, according to research- ers from Rutgers University in New Jer- sey in the United States. The study examined 47 women aged between 50 and 79 who were classed as overweight or obese. All the women were asked to reduce their intake of calories by 500 per day, with 26 of the participants asked to restrict their eat- ing to a window of nine hours, while the rest continued to eat in the typical window with about 12 hours between their first and last food of the day. Those in the time-restricted group tended to eat only between 10am and 6pm, with an average window of 8.2 hours, compared with an average of 12.3 hours for the other groups. After six months, the participants had lost an average of 6.8kg, with no difference between the two groups. However, those who ate only within the nine-hour window showed “signifi- cant improvements on spatial planning and problem-solving tests at the end of the programme” compared with the performances of the other group. They also showed a trend toward fewer errors on memory and learning tests, but there was no significant differ- ence in performance on multitasking or reaction time tests. “Losing weight alone will ward off some of the ageing-related cognitive decline, and these data suggest that there may be additional benefits if you stop eating four hours prior to going to sleep and reduce food intake to eight to nine hours per day,” said Dr Sue Shapses, a professor at Rutgers Uni- versity and Rutgers-RWJ Medical Center who led the study. The researchers said that further studies in larger groups were needed to confirm the findings.
on sale for £87m
F
or any budding David Attenborough wanting their own slice of paradise, or a billionaire wanting to create a private ranch with a spare £87 million, there is a modern-day Garden of Eden for sale (David Byers writes). An ecological reserve with an abundant population of sea turtles, dolphins, flamingos and spoonbills, as well as four miles of its own beachfront on the northern Yucatan peninsula, has just been put up for sale in what is believed to be the most expensive private estate to be listed in Mexican history. El Cuyo estate — which is two and a half hours from Cancun by road and stretches to 346 acres — is the passion project of Mónica Hernández
Anger from passengers as Gatwick left without water
Lara Bowman One in five new buy-to-let businesses in the UK are being set up by overseas landlords. Figures from the estate agency Hamptons show 27,200 buy-to-let companies were set up in the first six months of the year and 19.5 per cent had at least one non-UK director — 56 per cent higher than the same period in 2016, when the figure was 12.5 per cent. Indian investors account for the highest proportion of directors, fol- lowed by Nigerians and then Irish. David Fell from Hamptons said: “While overall numbers of buy-to-let company creations are levelling off at between 4,000 and 5,000 a month following years of rapid expansion, international engagement in the UK private rented sector remains histori- cally high. Crucially, however, buy-in is largely driven by non-UK nationals living in the UK rather than overseas investors. “For those investing from abroad, personal ownership remains the pre- ferred vehicle, given many overseas tax regimes tend to be more generous than HMRC regarding how they treat rental income.” Using companies to purchase buy- to-lets has become increasingly popu- lar in recent years, as it provides signifi- cant tax benefits. Landlords who hold property in their own name get a tax
Gatwick airport was without running water yesterday after a power cut at a nearby treatment works, leaving passengers unable to flush lavatories, wash their hands or buy hot drinks. The airport said a water supply problem in the Horley area had af- fected both North and South terminals. Although flights continued to oper- ate, restaurants and cafés were unable to make drinks, drinking fountains were out of action and food outlets were forced to close or restrict service. Gatwick said on X that bottled water was being made available but passen- gers disputed the claim and said there had been a lack of communication. SES Water, which supplies more than 750,000 customers across east Surrey and parts of West Sussex, Kent and south London, said a power cut at its Bough Beech Water Treatment Works had caused “some customers” to experience “low water pressure or a temporary loss of supply”. A spokesman said: “We are working to overcome those complications and return the treatment works to supply ... Gatwick airport is being affected but we are working with them while our teams work to restore normal service as quickly as possible.” Gatwick said on social media
Ramírez, 75, a Mexican landscape designer, and her husband, Aníbal González Torres, 81, an award-winning architect and painter from Seville in Spain. The couple invested in the isolated estate 30 years ago for what they describe as “big money”. When they bought El Cuyo, the reserve’s coconut farm had failed due to a devastating plant disease that had swept through the Yucatan peninsula in the 1990s, wiping out millions of coconut palms, which were then felled and burnt by the military. With the trees gone, the couple decided to bring it back to nature, having been mesmerised by sightings of flamingos and spoonbills in visits to the area.
yesterday: “A water issue in the Horley area is causing disruption at the airport this morning. The problem is affecting water supply in both terminals and is currently under investigation. “Bottled water is being made available to passengers and staff across the airport and other contingency measures are being put in place to ensure the welfare of our passengers.” SES Water posted an update on X shortly before 6pm: “Supplies are gradually returning for impacted cus- tomers including Gatwick airport — it will take time for the network to fully return to normal as this has been a highly unusual and complex issue. We want to reiterate our teams are working as quickly as they possibly can.” No update was provided on when lavatories, restaurants and other services would resume normal service. Passengers vented their frustrations on social media. Many criticised the communication from Gatwick and dis- puted that bottled water was available. Charlotte Anstey wrote: “There’s not been a single sign of anyone handing out water. I’m at the airport right now and am told the water works before security — why were we not told the final toilets would be before security?” Another passenger, Paul, wrote: “This came way too late. And even now there’s no announcement at the airport.
“The original vegetation came back [after the coconut trees were burnt] and the wildlife is amazing,” Hernández Ramírez said. The couple fell in love with El Cuyo — which is traversed by a
El Cuyo, a 346-acre reserve in Mexico, has been earmarked as a luxury retreat. Its owners, Mónica Hernández
Ramírez and Aníbal González Torres, decided to restore an old coconut farm after seeing flamingos in the area
white-sand road and has no permanent buildings — because of their passion for conservation. She said: “The property is a paradise ... Our neighbours are turtles — three different kinds. And then there are dolphins. You know, when the season comes, the dolphins arrive. And so it’s really something very unusual and very beautiful.” Her husband said the
Chaos, passengers don’t know what’s going on. Is the management team on leave or what’s going on.” Michael Dugher, the former Labour shadow defence secretary, questioned why passengers were not being allowed to sit in closed restaurants. He wrote on social media: “At least allow people to use the chairs in all the closed restaurants and bars. No water is one thing, but depriving people of somewhere to sit is another … families are having to sit on the floor.” One of the first to raise the alarm on social media was the broadcaster Julia Hartley-Brewer. Before Gatwick’s an- nouncement, she wrote: “If you’re on your way to Gatwick airport, it might be helpful to know that there is no running water across the entire airport. “That means no coffees, no water fountains, no flushing toilets and no hand washing. Gatwick hasn’t bothered to make a public announcement about this to passengers. How helpful.” In SES Water’s long-term resilience strategy, it said power cuts affecting the Bough Beech Water Treatment works had increased by 70 per cent since 2020, warning they could lead to shutdowns of drinking water production. It said engineers were working to restore supplies as quickly as possible but had not given a timescale for the return of normal service.
pair are so in love with the pristine beach that he can no longer enjoy the beaches of his native Spain. “I never put my foot on the beach there,” he joked. They have received planning permission from the Mexican government to create a luxury residential complex at El Cuyo — on the condition that they stick to the ultra- strict eco-conservation requirements of the
in five buy-to-let businesses
style architecture in an oval shape with open-air layouts, wooden frames, stone feature walls and pitched thatch roofs made of palm or grass. Given their age, however, the couple have decided to sell their reserve, along with the planning permission. It is the perfect for an ecologist, Hernández Ramírez said. “The people who will live here must be guardians of nature,” she said.
area. They worked with the designers Casa e Progetti to create a blueprint for a resort that would use reclaimed natural materials and renewable energy. It is meant to contain 64 villas, each with 328ft of private beachfront, located on plots of between 2.5 and 6.9 acres. Each villa would be 5,000 sq ft with four or five bedrooms. It would be built in Mayan-
credit on their mortgage interest at the 20 per cent basic rate, but those who own through a corporate structure can deduct 100 per cent of their borrowing costs from their tax bill. Hamptons estimates that about 75 per cent of new buy-to-let purchases are held in company structures. Nearly 67,000 buy-to-let companies were set up last year, up from 10,239 in 2015. The make-up of nationalities using this method to invest in UK properties has shifted eastwards in the past decade, due to immigration flows par- tially driven by Brexit. In 2016 the list was dominated by English-speaking nationalities and those from western Europe. Then, Irish was the nationality with the highest proportion of shareholders in newly created businesses at with 1.5 per cent of all directors. Chinese were second, Indians were third, while the list also included Germans, French, Italians, Americans and Australians. This year’s list puts Indians at the top with 1.69 per cent of all directors, while the list also includes Nigerians, Roma- nians, Pakistanis and Lithuani- ans. Marc von Grundherr from the London estate agent Benham and Reeves said it had “seen a noticeable in- crease in interest from Turkish buyers”. This year was the first time since 2015 that the proportion of non-UK share- holder directors had fallen in a decade, from a high of 20.4 per cent of share- holders being from overseas last year.
Monday July 27 2026 | the times News Hundreds of health bosses earn more than PM in ‘culture of rewarding failure’
Poppy Koronka
than the prime minister, according to analysis by the Taxpayers’ Alliance. Some 574 senior health leaders had higher salaries than Andy Burnham, an increase of 12 per cent in one year. The analysis found that 1,758 man- agers were paid more than £100,000 a
10,000
Drawing inspiration A giant homage to the late David Hockney has been created outside the West Oxford Community Centre by the artist Andrew “Mani” Manson
NHS wards and private rooms
Bill Curtis
placing them in mixed-sex accommo- dation, an analysis of care regulator reports has revealed, amid a record- high admission rate. NHS trusts and private healthcare providers have been criticised by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) over failures to protect women, including some who have been exposed to men undressing in their presence and left without access to gendered toilets. NHS England figures show a record 53,874 patients were treated in mixed- sex accommodation last year in breach of its own guidance. The total is more than double the 19,700 that was record- ed in the year before the pandemic. Non-statutory guidance issued in 2010 banned mixed-gender accommo- dation except in circumstances such as chemotherapy wards where patients “may derive comfort from the presence of other patients with similar condi- tions”. Since then, however, women have continued to report breaches of their privacy and dignity. Alexis Quinn, 42, said she was sexu- ally assaulted multiple times on a mixed-sex psychiatric ward in 2016
cent from the previous year. The num-
ber being paid more than £300,000
more than doubled from last year. The
prime minister is paid £174,039.31.
Stuart Andrew, the shadow health
secretary, said: “Running the NHS is a
demanding job and managers should
be rewarded for delivering results. But
paying managers large bonuses while
shortly after the death of her brother. After the alleged assault, staff decided to detain Quinn, who had undiagnosed autism at the time, in a seclusion room before she was able to escape. She said the feeling of vulnerability was overwhelming and called the system a recipe for disaster. She said: “Every woman placed in mixed-sex accommodation is another sitting duck being put at risk. It is appalling that NHS leaders have let the problem slip under the radar, despite overwhelming evidence it is affecting a growing num- ber of patients.” A CQC report, published in April, found that Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust’s collection of five mixed-sex community mental health crisis facilities, known as The Havens, did “not operate safely to protect patients from risk of harm”. It said: “We observed both male and female patients being cared for in the same room while they slept on recliner chairs only separated by curtains,” inspectors said, giving an example of one man who had taken their clothes off because the room lacked ventilation. In 2022 campaigners from the Women’s Rights Network found thou-
value for taxpayers or fair on NHS frontline staff.” Many poorly performing trusts have had new chiefs executives brought in to improve their services and they are of- ten paid high salaries for their expertise in hospital reform. According to the alliance, East Cheshire had the worst A&E waiting
Patients failed
Breaches of the mixed-sex
accommodation guidance
Data
unavailable
2012 14 16 18 20 22 24 26
Source: NHS England
saults reported in hospitals and warned the rise in mixed-sex accommodation could contribute to further offences. Mary Howden, who carried out the research, said: “The current rise in mixed-sex accommodation breaches is not a minor administrative failure; it is a safeguarding failure that places women at avoidable risk.” The CQC criticised a rehabilitation centre run by Essex Partnership Uni- versity NHS Foundation Trust over “concerns about sexual safety”. Inspec- tors found leaders “failed to fully in- vestigate” alleged offences and “did not
chief executive, Ged Murphy, was paid £377,500 in 2024-25, rising from £172,500 the year before. Anne Strickland, researcher at the alliance, said that Burnham’s new government “has an early opportunity to show taxpayers it will get a grip on this culture of rewarding failure”. She added: “Ministers must keep their
were alerted”. The report from April said there were 69 incidents recorded in the previous six months and it found evidence of six sexual safety incidents. Separately, the Haynes Clinic, a pri- vate residential substance misuse ser- vice, was found to be “inadequate” by the regulator in a report in March. In 2023 We Do Recover CIC, a pri- vate substance misuse centre in Liver- pool, shut down and faced heavy fines because it operated unlawfully without required health registrations and failed basic safety standards. Both male and female patients using the facilities were also found to be sharing “the same bathrooms and living spaces”. The CQC said: “All patients have the right to be treated with dignity and re- spect and to feel safe in their surround- ings. We expect providers to comply with the law and relevant guidance on mixed sex accommodation.” The NHS said: “The NHS is fully committed to offering same-sex accommodation, and — while there are certain clinical circumstances in which mixed accommodation is necessary — it is clear we need to reverse this un- acceptable trend and eliminate unjusti- fied breaches.”
12,000
2,000
8,000
6,000
4,000
GEOFFREY SWAINE/SHUTTERSTOCK
failing NHS bosses are held account- able.” The health department said: “We have made clear that pay must be linked to performance with a new policy that means only high-performing leaders are rewarded, while those who fail to improve services and cut waiting times no longer receive automatic pay rises.”
spent £631m on diversity initiatives’
Jessica Sharkey Crime Correspondent
equity and inclusion initiatives have cost British police an estimated £631 million since 2020, a think tank has claimed. The report by Policy Exchange esti- mated that forces and police and crime commissioners have incurred £431 million in manpower costs of training, £177 million on dedicated in- clusion roles and £23 million on exter- nal consultancy since May 2020. It said that police budgeting ranged from Hampshire and Isle of Wight Constab- ulary’s £861,000 “Inclusion Matters” scheme to Stonewall training, courses and an £8,000 film and poetry project. In his report, David Spencer, a former Metropolitan Police detective chief inspector and Policy Exchange’s head of crime and justice, said it was “simply wrong” money was “diverted away from the fight against crime”. Such initiatives were criticised in the wake of the murder of Henry Nowak, 18, who was handcuffed as he lay dying after his killer Vickrum Digwa falsely accused him of racist abuse. The Inde- pendent Office for Police Conduct is investigating the two officers who first arrived on the scene for potential gross misconduct. In 1999, the Macpherson inquiry un- covered failings in the Metropolitan Police’s investigation into the murder of Stephen Lawrence and concluded the force was “institutionally racist”. The National Police Chiefs’ Council’s “Police Race Action Plan” published in 2022 said officers should “respond to individuals and communities accord- ing to their specific needs” and added: “It does not mean treating everyone ‘the same’ or being ‘colour blind’ (racial equality).” In June, the NPCC said it was reviewing the document after the policing minister Sarah Jones said it “gives the wrong impression”. The report by Policy Exchange found that 73 per cent of UK police forces have created their own local race action plans, with 87 per cent including ex- plicit “anti-racist” commitments. The think tank made several recom- mendations, including introducing a “Police Impartiality Act” to set out im- partiality requirements for forces and scrapping the national race action plan. However, a recent report by the Children’s Commissioner said black children are eight times more likely to be strip searched by police than white children in England and Wales. Gov- ernment figures published in 2024 showed that black people are 2.2 times as likely to be arrested as white people. A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are committed to ensuring the police can perform their role without fear or favour and are categorical that they must treat everyone equally and without discrimination — regardless of their ethnicity.”
Ben Ellery Deputy Chief Reporter
A national recall has been issued for versions of a popular children’s squeeze toy after tests found excessive levels of benzene, a toxic chemical that can cause cancer. The toys, sold as Squeezy Dumplings, are soft plastic dumplings with a smil- ing face inside small basket-style pots. They have become one of the year’s biggest playground crazes after being popularised by TikTok videos showing them being unboxed, squeezed and stretched. Their appeal combines the tactile quality of a stress ball with the
Raiding party A performer at the Valhalla Viking Festival, near Basingstoke,
at the weekend which included feasts, mock battles, workshops and activities
epic rush to learn Greek
Georgia Lambert
Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey is making waves among film fans, but it appears the epic is also inspiring thousands to learn Greek. An analysis of Google Trends by the language-learning site Preply shows that UK searches for “learn Greek” have risen by 550 per cent in a month, reaching about 6,000 monthly search- es as excitement for the film builds. Although Homer’s epic was com- posed in ancient Greek nearly 3,000 years ago, experts say the fascination is being driven by audiences eager to connect with the mythology, land- scapes and history depicted in the film. Madeline Enos, a language trends expert at Preply, said: “Homer’s Ody- ssey was composed in ancient Greek, which differs significantly from the lan- guage spoken in Greece today. Ancient Greek offers the opportunity to engage more closely with Homer’s original text and the wider classical world, while modern Greek can help people connect with contemporary Greek culture and communicate with speakers today.” She added: “Whether someone is curi-
“blind box” format used by other col- lectible crazes, with buyers opening identical sealed pots in the hope of finding unusual colours or rare glitter versions. The Office for Product Safety and Standards has classified an imitation version of the product as posing a “seri- ous” chemical risk after benzene was found at a concentration of 20mg per kilogram in its outer layer. Benzene is a carcinogen. According to the recall notice, inhaling it can irri- tate the eyes, nose and throat, while exposure to large amounts may cause skin irritation and a burning sensation
ous about the language of Homer or the Greek spoken today, that spark can lead to a deeper understanding of Greece’s linguistic and cultural heritage.” The teaching of classics faces challen- ges over access in schools and colleges. Although independent schools remain far more likely to offer classics and ancient Greek, opportunities for pupils in the state sector are uneven. However, schools that want to introduce or ex- pand these subjects can access specialist support through the government to help them deliver the curriculum. In 2021 Baroness Greenfield, an Oxford neuroscientist, told The Times Education Commission that the study of classics could play an important role in brain development. Months before the release of the film on July 17, the “Odyssey effect” was taking hold online, as users on Reddit swapped advice on how to learn Homeric Greek, the literary dialect of ancient Greek. In Britain, almost 40,000 copies of The Odyssey have been sold this year, up by 70 per cent on last year. In the week preceding the film’s release, almost 5,000 print copies were sold.
throughout the digestive tract. Parents have been told to stop children using the toys and keep them out of reach. The official re- call names Sam- sons Cash and Carry, a distributor based in Cardiff, but the problem is much
The toys have a smiling
face inside a small pot
PETER TARRY FOR THE TIMES
How to be Hopeful
Join us for a brilliantly funny and uplifting evening as Times columnist Caitlin Moran
hits the stage for the London instalment of her nationwide tour. In conversation with
her friend and colleague – Times Radio presenter Hugo Rifkind – Caitlin will unravel
the themes of her essential new book, How to be Hopeful: A Year of Attempting to
Feel Less Awful About the World.
St Mary’s Church, Bryanston Square, London, W1H 1PQ
more widespread. More than 1,000 apparently coun- terfeit Squeezy Dump- lings were seized from shops across Hull after benzene was discovered in some of them. Trading standards officers later de- stroyed the toys. Officials warned that unsafe copies could be difficult to dis- tinguish from genuine products and urged parents to
check the packaging and buy only from reputable retailers. The Chinese-made product covered by the recall does not comply with the Toys (Safety) Regulations 2011 and im- provements are also required to its la- belling and safety markings. There are no batch numbers or other identifiers on the product or packaging, making it difficult for parents to estab- lish whether a toy is affected. Samsons Cash and Carry has re- called the product from customers. Owners seeking further information have been advised to contact the com- pany.
in schools has aided learning, teachers say
Georgia Lambert, Riana McConochie
Headteachers in the first borough to introduce a smartphone-free schools policy say children are no less safe with- out the devices, because carrying expensive phones to and from school can increase the risk of theft. After Barnet introduced England’s first borough-wide smartphone ban in schools last September, heads who had already banned them, said the evidence justified their approach. They report fewer distractions in lessons, less cyber- bullying, more face-to-face interaction between pupils and calmer schools. All 103 primary schools in the London borough have prohibited de- vices and 23 secondary schools re- moved smartphones and smartwatch- es from this year’s cohort. However, several secondary schools were years ahead of the curve. At Bishop Douglass Catholic School in East Finchley, mobile phones have been prohibited during the day for more than 20 years. Michelle Henderson, the headteach- er, said: “We do not believe that carry- ing a phone necessarily makes a child safer. A visible and valuable smart- phone can make a young person more vulnerable to theft, and in the event of a serious incident it is often unrealistic to imagine that a child would be able to take out a phone and use it safely.” Instead, pupils are told to seek help from trusted adults, such as the police, transport staff and shop workers, who can contact parents or the emergency services if required. Henderson said children also did bet- ter academically. The school’s sixth form is joint first for progress among Barnet’s non-selective schools and is in the top 7 per cent nationally. “A mobile phone-free environment enhances concentration in lessons, promotes positive behaviour, reduces opportunities for bullying, improves attendance and supports the wellbeing of every pupil.” At Clarion School, a secondary school and sixth-form, a phone-free policy was introduced in 2022 and re- placed an “out of sight” rule. Chris Hunt, the headteacher, said: “The inspi- ration for our solution actually came from a concert I attended, where audi-
Stars sell treasures to help Gazan scholars waiting in the wings
An annotated theatre script, a necklace worn on stage and a vintage couture brooch are among the personal items being offered by three of Britain’s most celebrated actresses to help a new gen- eration of Palestinian scholars reach the universities that have accepted them. Dame Harriet Walter, 75, Dame Vanessa Redgrave, 89, and Dame Janet Suzman, 87, are among 23 celebrities who have donated memorabilia for a charity auction raising funds for schol- arships to leading UK universities for Gazan students. The auction aims to provide a lifeline for talented students
ence members were required to place their phones in lockable pouches. I re- alised this could be the perfect solution for a school environment, and we pio- neered the approach here.” At the school pupils lock their phones into Yondr pouches. Senior staff check compliance at the gates, carry out ran- dom bag checks and contact parents to verify claims that pupils have not brought a device to school. A phone not in a pouch is confiscated for seven days. Pupils did try to beat the system by placing dummy phones in the pouches and keeping their real devices, but con- sistent enforcement and random checks all but stopped that and only a handful of phones are seized every year. “We have seen a noticeable increase in students socially interacting with one another, chatting at lunch, and par- ticipating in extracurricular activities before, during, and after school,” Hunt said. “The students themselves now genuinely understand how much they benefit from being disconnected during the school day.” At Queen Elizabeth’s Girls’ School smartphones have been banned for pupils in years 7 to 11 since 2017. Pupils at the high-performing, non-selective academy may bring a basic mobile phone, which must be switched off before school and kept out of sight. Any smartphone or internet-enabled device is confiscated for ten school days. “There were families who did not agree with the change in rules,” Violet Walker, the headteacher, said. Parents’ main concern was not being able to stay in touch with their children after school or track their journey home. However, Walker said brick phones worked well and many parents used Apple AirTags to keep track of their children. “Follow- ing the ban, we found a significant drop in incidents of cyberbullying through social media,” she added. A spokesperson for Barnet Educa- tion and Learning Services, which is owned by the council, said: “Research shows that children aged 11-15 are most vulnerable to negative influences from social media and internet access via smartphones. We encourage parents to delay giving smartphones to children until at least age 14 and access to social media until age 16.”
who have secured places at the univer- sities but are unable to take them up without financial support. Last month the government announced that a group of students holding fully funded scholarships and meeting immigration rules would be helped to leave Gaza to continue their studies in the UK. More than two hun- dred students in Gaza have earned places at universities, including Oxford and Cambridge, but are unable to leave. Despite a ceasefire announced in October, the crisis continues, and Israeli forces have since killed more than a thousand people, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.
It’s me, Cathy Participants at The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever gathering in Birmingham yesterday. The event takes
place in cities across the globe, celebrating Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights by recreating the pop video’s choreography
Girlguiding has unveiled the first major redesign of its uniform in more than 30 years, with the aim to “foster a true sense of belonging”. In a pared-back version of the previous approach, members will be required to wear only a top from the new range to be considered “in uni- form” after feedback from thousands of guides, rainbows, brownies and rangers suggested they valued choice. Launching the new uniform, Felicity Oswald, chief executive of Girlguiding, said that it had been designed in collaboration with thousands of girls and young women and aimed to give girls “the freedom to express them- selves whilst feeling part of our amaz-
ing organisation”. The organisation said the uniform combined the charity’s heritage and tradi- tional brand recognition with modern colours and prints, design features including hidden pockets in waist bands, thumb holes, and badge sashes which dou- ble as cross-body bags. The range, by Hem- mingway Design, is made up of 30 gar- ments, 15 accessories and neckerchiefs, with the latter able to be per- sonalised. Girlguiding said that its survey of
Dame Harriet Walter, far
left, donated a Julius
Caesar script to the
auction. Dame Vanessa
Redgrave wears the
necklace she has given
The auction includes Walter’s script from the all-female production of Julius Caesar at the Donmar Warehouse in London, alongside signed copies of two of her books. Redgrave is offering the neck- lace she wore during her Tony award- winning performance as Mary Tyrone in the 2003 Broadway revival of Eugene
2,000 girls aged six to 16 in the UK in June found that 93 per cent said they felt most comfortable when they could choose how to style themselves. Angellica Bell, a Girlguiding ambassador, broadcaster and present- er, said: “The new uniform empowers girls and volunteers to embrace their individual- ity.” The redesign began in March 2024 and up- dates the 1990 version.
Girls in items from the
range, which includes
30 garments and accessories
O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night. Suzman has donated a vintage Christ- ian Lacroix brooch. Paapa Essiedu, 36, who plays Severus Snape in the upcoming Harry Potter TV series, has given his copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. He said: “This old treasured book is proof that miracles can happen.” Juliet Stevenson, the actress, 69, has given her copy of The Concise Encyclo- pedia of English and American Poets and Poetry, one of the first poetry books she owned. She said the auction “seemed like a no-brainer” to take part in. Funds will be donated to Phoenix Space, the education charity.
‘TikTok grandad’ vows to go the distance on cancer hike
halfway through his gruelling 462-mile charity fundraiser, says Riana McConochie
A 78-year-old TikToker with cancer has crossed the halfway point on his more than 450-mile trek across England and Wales to raise money for charity. John Parry, a Welsh grandfather, set off on June 21 and crossed the border between England and Wales yesterday, marking over half of his hike complet- ed. Parry’s aim is to trek 462 miles from the most easterly point of England, Lowestoft in Suffolk, to the most west- erly point of Wales, St David’s Head in Pembrokeshire, along the Via Beata route. Parry was diagnosed with cancer in October 2024 and has since taken to TikTok under the handle @Welsh- Grandad to inspire others affected by the illness to keep fighting. He is fundraising for Cancer Re- search, Macmillan Cancer Support, Farleigh Hospice and St David’s Hos- pice, and is using his online platform to document each day of his journey. So far, Parry has raised more than £37,000 towards his goal of £50,000 and received hundreds of comments and messages of support. “I didn’t quite expect to have this response. The reaction to what I’m doing and the funds I’m trying to generate has been absolutely amazing,” he said. Parry said that he had not once felt defeated while undertaking his challenge. “Even when I’ve been absolutely worn out, drip- ping with sweat and out of water, all I think about is the people whose cancers are worse than mine and are facing an uncertain future. “The people I know are suffering more than me, they keep me going and mo- tivate me,” he said. Alongside a support team of family and friends, Parry has been met along the way by fans, passers-by and even Lauren Oakley, the Strictly Come Dancing star. “The kind-
Andrew Ellson
Andrew Ellson
Consumer Affairs Correspondent
The traditional cure for first-date nerves has always been a stiff drink. For many young Britons, however, it now appears to be putting on the kettle. Almost half of Generation Z say they reach for a cup of tea, not alcohol, to steady their nerves before a big mo- ment, according to research that sug- gests the nation’s youngest adults are giving “Dutch courage” a British twist. The survey found that 47 per cent of 18 to 27-year-olds preferred tea over a tipple when preparing for daunting occasions, almost double the propor-
John Parry, who has raised tens of thousands, was joined by the Strictly star Lauren Oakley along the way
ness of people has been phenomenal. It’s been an absolute honour to walk with these people,” he said. “It renews your faith in human nature.” Parry is determined to complete the walk, no matter the impact on his body. Rising at 4.30am each morning to beat the heat, Parry has navigated dead ends, wrong turns, bram- bles and nettles. “I’ve crawled on my hands and knees through overgrown fields, and I’ve been cut to pieces by bram- bles. It’s so bad in places, you’d need a
tion among baby boomers, at 25 per cent. The findings in a survey for Twin- ings reflect a contradiction in Britain’s changing relationship with tea. Research has consistently shown that younger adults drink less black tea than their parents and grandparents and that coffee is their default caffeinated drink. Recent YouGov polling found only one in ten of Gen Z had a cup of tea every day compared with one in three Gen Xers and baby boomers. Yet those who do put on the kettle appear increasingly likely to reserve it for moments that feel significant, turning tea drinking into a ritual. Cafés have reported booming
machete to get through.” Before under- taking the challenge, Parry consulted a doctor who told him that doing such a strenuous walk at his age would put his body under strain. Despite this, he chose to go ahead, saying: “I didn’t think of the consequen- ces. I knew if I didn’t do it, people wouldn’t be helped, so I didn’t have a choice in my own mind. “I know cancer makes me tired, but that’s part of it. I’m a fairly determined person. As my wife says, I’ll do it on my hands and knees if I have to.” With the uphill hike across Wales to go, Parry feels the hardest part is yet to come.“I struggle with hills because my left lung doesn’t inflate so I can’t get enough oxygen into my body ... But it’s just one foot in front of the other. Nothing’s going to stop me now.” When his first TikTok got thousands of responses from fellow cancer
demand for speciality teas such as matcha among younger customers, suggesting that while Gen Z may drink fewer cups, they are more selective about when and why it is time for tea. Occasions that most call for a “prep- aration brew” include university ex- ams, work meetings, driving tests and difficult conversations with the boss. For Isabella Ayala Heaton, 25, tea is a substitute for liquid confidence on a first date. “It helps me get into the right mindset,” said the vide- ographer from London. “I
patients, Parry was certain that he wanted to help. In his videos, Parry discusses ways of dealing with the condition, such as activities which take your mind off it and keep the anxiety at bay; Parry paints and draws to cope with these feelings. He said: “Hospices are having to close beds and wards because they don’t have enough money and it’s absolutely disgraceful that in this society, we are allowing that to happen. “I’ll do whatever I can to help people who are suffering. That’s all I want to do; I just want to help people.” Alex Howe, a relationship fund- raising manager at Macmillan Cancer Support, said: “John’s determination is nothing short of remarkable. To take on a challenge of this scale whilst navigat- ing his own cancer diagnosis is an extraordinary testament to his resilience, courage and generosity.
guess you could say it’s my own version of Dutch courage.” One of her more memorable dates began with an order that raised eye- brows. “I ordered a cup of tea in a pub instead of a pint,” she said. “It got a few funny looks, but we ended up laughing about it — and we’re still to- gether six months later.” The survey sug- gests that for many the ritual is as important as the drink. Almost a third described mak-
drum up a record year for live music
Last year Oasis reunited, Beyoncé rolled into Tottenham and Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa and Sabrina Carpenter filled arenas night after night. The result was a year in which Britain fell back in love with live music, creat- ing the biggest financial windfall the industry has ever enjoyed. Britons spent a record £7.6 billion on live music, up almost 13 per cent on the previous year and nearly 69 per cent higher than before the pandemic, according to figures published by Live, the umbrella body representing the UK’s live music industry. The figures suggest that the appetite for live entertainment has not merely recovered from Covid-19 but has pro- duced a new golden age, fuelled by a succession of blockbuster tours that persuaded fans to think little of paying hundreds of pounds for tickets, hotels, merchandise and pre-show drinks. Oasis’s reunion tour became the cultural event of last year, and tickets disappeared within minutes as millions scrambled online in the hope of seeing Liam and Noel Gallagher share a stage for the first time in 16 years. Industry estimates suggest their tour generated between £400 million and £460 million in ticket sales and merchandise. They were far from alone. Coldplay continued their record-breaking world tour, Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter shows at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium became one of the year’s hottest tickets and Bil- lie Eilish sold out six consecutive nights at London’s O2 Arena. According to Live, there were 232,000 gigs in Britain last year, about 1 per cent more than the previous year, which itself was a record. Jon Collins, chief executive of Live, said: “2025 was another strong year for live music as we once again demon- strated our unique ability to reach all parts of the UK.” However, many small venues, which have little room to increase ticket prices to offset rising costs, are struggling. The industry has attempted to bridge the divide through the Live Trust, which channels money from major tours into grassroots music. It has distributed £1.5 million, but even so, the pressure is showing. Although consumer spending surged, employment in live music edged down by 0.1 per cent to 234,456 jobs, the first annual decline since the industry reopened after the pandemic. Ministers have announced new busi- ness rates relief for pubs, clubs and live music venues as part of wider reforms to reduce costs for hospitality and the creative industries.
ing tea as calming, while one in four saw it as a form of “low-effort self-care”. Gill Close, marketing director at Twinings, said. “A cup of tea has long been part of family life. Younger con- sumers are making it work for them.” Bryony Osmond, a master blender, said Gen Z was driving demand for lighter blends over a “breakfast brew”. The shift mirrors a wider change in the drinking habits of young Britons. Research from groups including the charity Drinkaware found that Gen Z drinks less alcohol than older people, citing health and wellbeing as reasons.
Monday July 27 2026 | the times News
warned over competitive behaviour
cial code of conduct for the first time to stop them disturbing wildlife and local residents. The move has been prompted by competitive behaviour that bothers birds as well as residents, who can suddenly find hordes of enthusiasts parked across driveways or encroach- ing on to their property. Sightings of rare birds — known as “megas” — can drive hundreds of twitchers armed with scopes, binocu- lars, cameras and other gear to private land such as farmers’ fields. The “Birders’ Code of Conduct” has been launched by the British Birds Rar- ities Committee, which assesses rare sightings, and BirdGuides, a website for hobbyists. The guide calls for watchers to not get too close to the birds or their habi- tats, stick to public footpaths and roads, keep discussions to a minimum and walk slowly when approaching rare birds. It also tells hobbyists not to play birdsong on phones to encourage birds, particularly during the breeding season, and to keep dogs on leads. The guide advises visitors not to park on driveways, passing places or access points, to leave room for emergency services and other vehicles to get past and to keep off private property. There are laws against disturbing rare birds and damaging habitats in a site of special scientific interest, which can carry fines of up to £5,000 and a six- month prison sentence. The guide recommends that bird- watchers become ambassadors for their hobby. “A friendly response, good view of a bird or a helpful answer may ignite a spark of interest in birds or a greater appreciation of wildlife and its conser- vation,” it says, adding: “Be polite, respectful and conscientious, enjoy the birds you see and help spread the word of our brilliant hobby.”
Laurence Sleator
Transport Correspondent
Chinese car imports is making it much more difficult for manufacturers to meet their environmental targets, a leading company has said. Stellantis, a group of 14 vehicle brands, including Fiat, Peugeot and Vauxhall, said it had “significant concerns” about the “sustained impacts” of imports from companies such as BYD and Chery. Under the zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate, sales of new pure petrol and diesel cars must end by 2030 and all new cars must be fully electric by 2035. Manufacturers are expected to sell an increasing percentage of electric vehicles or face fines. This year the target is 33 per cent, rising to 38 per cent next year. In a letter sent in April to Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary, and Peter Kyle, the business secretary at the time, Eurig Druce, group managing director of Stellantis UK, warned that the target was causing an “intolerable commercial impact” on its business. He said the proportion of new EVs sold in the first quarter of this year was
the transport
Breaking a sweat The newsreader and broadcaster Sophie Raworth at the end of a four-day, 80-mile endurance run across
the Italian Alps, during which she saw marmots, ibex and a golden eagle. “Great team, incredible experience,” she said
ZEV mandate goals were “not achievable and not aligned to the level of customer adoption in the UK”. The letter, revealed in freedom of information requests by The Fast Charge newsletter, added that the challenge was being “exacerbated” by the government’s policy to “welcome likely heavily subsidised Chinese products into the UK”. Competitively priced Chinese brands account for just under a fifth of new ZEV registrations so far this year. Hybrid models, such as the Jaecoo 7, which looks similar to a Range Rover, are proving popular. Unlike in the European Union and the US, the UK does not apply ad- ditional tariffs on Chinese car imports. More than 196,000 vehicles made by Chinese brands were sold in the UK last year, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), double the 96,000 sold in 2024. This year the government is to review the targets imposed by the man- date. There are reports that the target is to be watered down after pressure from the industry and unions fearful of manufacturing job losses. In April a joint letter to the govern-
such as the
Nissan called for an adjustment of the mandate trajectory. The companies said the present targets were “too stringent” and ignored the cost of complying. “As companies with significant operations in the UK, directly employ- ing over 30,000 people, making over £3 billion in investments in the last decade and supporting thousands more jobs throughout the supply chain, we have come together to present our shared perspective on the urgent need for reform,” the companies wrote.
the transport secre- tary from Mike Hawes, chief execu- tive of SMMT, said the mandate meant the industry was having to main- tain “significant and unsustaina- ble incentives” to drive demand. Ginny Buck- ley, chief execu- tive of the electric
Chinese imports,
popular BYD
Seal, are making
a challenging
situation worse,
carmakers told
secretary, Heidi
Alexander, below
cry it’s not cricket over fake wicket
Amelia Stout
install an artificial wicket in the national park have reignited a dispute with commoners over their historic animal grazing rights. Cadnam Cricket Club is seeking to extend its pavilion to accommodate changing and lavatory facilities for women, children and disabled people, and to implement pitch improvements including a patch of artificial grass. However, the plans have been de- scribed by commoners as “appalling”. Andrew Parry-Norton, the chairman of the Commoners Defence Associa- tion, said: “Cadnam Cricket Club has al- ways been a small New Forest cricket club, but now their ambitions seem to have grown much larger. “This is not the right location and it will harm the forest — but the club seems to be determined to ride com- pletely roughshod over everything.” The club has been at odds with commoners since it refused to open its pitch to grazing stock in the autumn. Paul Godfrey, its chairman, said the land for the pitch had never been used for grazing and was in fact a waste ground for depositing building materi- als until it was cleared by the club in the 1950s. He added: “I understand that commoning is an important part of the forest but so is the chance for people to have opportunities to play sport. While I respect that the ponies have been here for a while, so have we — we are part of the forest too.” Plans for the extension have been submitted to the New Forest National Park Authority and endorsed by the parish council and Natural England, which says they are unlikely to have any significant effect on the area. Plans for the wicket were granted conditional permission in 2023, and the club in- tends to install it this summer.
disagreed and said it was buyers who had been the “biggest winners” since the entry of Chinese cars into the market. “Chinese brands have made electric cars more affordable and accessible, giving drivers more choice,” she said. “Going back to dirty petrol and diesel technology would only make things worse. The UK would be less attractive for building cars and we’d be further behind the competition in China.” The Department for Transport said: “We remain committed to phasing out all new non-zero emission car and van sales by 2035. “The UK EV market is strong and growing — with sales up 35 per cent on June last year — and we’re backing manu- facturers through our £2 bil- lion electric car grant, which is boosting sales and helping more drivers into EVs.” A Stellantis spokesman said: “The current automo- tive operating environment is challenging, which we have explained clearly and factually to government.”
N
Trevor Phillips
@trevorptweets
ew leaders always promise change. But some do it with less conviction than others. Keir Starmer’s first speech as PM in July 2024 spoke of “sacrifice … weariness … a draining away of hope”. It was the political equivalent of Eeyore’s greeting: “Good morning, Pooh Bear. If it is a good morning. Which I doubt. Don’t blame me if it rains.” By contrast, opening his No 10 North, Andy Burnham declared last Friday to be the best day of his life. Britain’s new leader could not have been more Tiggerish if he had donned an orange and black stripy top, bounced up and down on springs, and declared: “The wonderful thing about Andys, is that Andys are wonderful things.” There’s no doubting his self-belief. Having conducted more than 400 interviews with senior politicians over the past three years, including both men, I believe that one reason the British people came to dislike Starmer was that he contrived to signal that, left to themselves, Brits were natural bigots and rogues who need to be restrained by law. It’s not true, but the country and the people of Starmer’s dreams exist largely in the legal fictions of United Nations bureaucracy. Jeremy Corbyn, Liz Truss, Boris Johnson, even Rishi Sunak all seemed to be alien impositions on the two parties many of us grew up with. Nigel Farage’s
apparent preference for a Britain that looks and sounds like the home counties of the 1930s, with added cryptocurrency, may seem attractive to a minority but most of Britain has moved on from that country. Burnham and Kemi Badenoch, on the other hand, evince a real enthusiasm for the people of Britain as they are now, warts and all, even though they differ about where we go next. Andy and Kemi — people are now referring to them by their first names — seem like emanations from the historical mainstreams of their tribes. But it won’t be enough to look and sound right. Burnham knows he needs to do more to stave off the threat from Reform. I think he’s making a decent fist of it. First, he is a natural cheerleader and crowdpleaser. Small but showy trims to energy bills, capping of bus fares and business rates for pubs won’t change the world, but they do
who get stuff done quietly and efficiently
give the impression of momentum. Second, he avoids the hectoring tone of identity politics. In Rachel Reeves’s resignation she referred, again, to having been the first female chancellor, David Lammy to being the first black deputy PM. Burnham has refrained from ostentatious references to the fact that his defence secretary is gay, his home secretary Muslim or his foreign secretary Jewish. Third, he is ruthless with both friends and enemies. For Starmer loyalists, last Monday was anything but happy. This is not a reshuffled cabinet; it is a new regime. By lunchtime, 11 cabinet ministers had
been handed their cards. But for his own coterie, too, there was a warning. No one gets a job just for having been on the winning team. They have to be effective in delivering for the public rather than the party. The public wants less immigration, less money spent on welfare and more money spent on defence. It has lost its enthusiasm for net zero at all costs. The Labour Party, generally speaking, wants the opposite. So in Shabana Mahmood, who remains at the Home Office, Pat McFadden at welfare and pensions and Wes Streeting, now at defence, he has chosen ministers noted for their willingness to confront their own activists. He has removed Ed Miliband from the energy brief and looks set to approve licences for oil and gas production in the North Sea. A further, little-noticed sideways move is the award of the crucial social care brief to the Hull MP Dame Diana Johnson, who has established a reputation as a quietly effective, pragmatic, non-factional, get-stuff-done operator of the kind Burnham prizes. Her leadership of the campaign around the infected blood scandal led to a landmark inquiry by Sir Brian Langstaff and a compensation fund amounting to more than £11 billion. Burnham doubtless sees an echo of his own dogged pursuit of justice for the Hillsborough families. None of the four ministers in whom he has placed his trust on these contentious issues hails from his Manchester circle. A cynic would snort that will mean, if they fail, that they are all politically expendable. A more generous spirit would welcome this as big tent politics and hail Burnham as a leader ready to reward competence and courage with responsibility. I lean towards the
Louise Haigh can be the fixer Burnham
needs, in the style of Willie Whitelaw
second interpretation. Finally, Burnham’s most telling political appointment is that of his effective deputy, Louise Haigh. In a previous column I suggested that Margaret Thatcher was right that every PM needs a Willie; her deputy William Whitelaw, like John Prescott for Tony Blair, acted as a behind-the-scenes cajoler, arm-twister and dealmaker. Whitelaw carried the burden of chairing key cabinet committees, watched the boss’s back and told her when she was about to make a mistake. Everyone knew that he was more than a messenger — she would back him in any dispute. He retired after a stroke in 1987. Some close colleagues believe that had he been at her right hand she might never have embarked on the disastrous experiment of the poll tax that
eventually ended her career. Burnham has found his Willie. Haigh resigned as transport secretary after she admitted to a criminal offence in her twenties involving a mobile phone. But few doubt her abilities; she was the youngest woman ever to reach cabinet rank. There have been comparisons made with another flame-haired Labour politician from the north, the only other woman ever to bear the
people imagined John Healey as chancellor
title of first secretary: Barbara Castle. I think the parallels are literally cosmetic. Wilson gave Castle a very specific role: to push through high-profile policies that he knew were necessary but unpopular at the time — compulsory seat belts and limits to trade union power. Castle complied and suffered for it. Haigh, on the other hand, though apparently averse to publicity, is already a power in the land. It was she who exerted the discipline that has been missing from Labour ranks for more than a decade and prevented the leaks running up to Burnham’s ascendancy. Only a handful of people even imagined the possibility of John Healey becoming chancellor. What does this all add up to? That those — including me — who have suggested that conventional politics, represented by the Labour and Conservative parties, has been in retreat for the past decade may be wrong. There is just a hint that Badenoch and Burnham between them may have started to mark out a steep, narrow path back to the nation’s trust for the way we used to do things.
A
M
Alex Massie
@alexmassie
ndy Burnham’s first days in office have been a disconcerting experience for some of us. Scarcely a day passes without a new policy announcement but, viewed from the true north, this is a movie many folk dimly recall having seen before. Why, I remember when Nicola Sturgeon announced she was going to end homelessness in Scotland and I remember, too, when the SNP promised to overhaul social care and establish a National Care Service. Neither of these things have actually happened and although we must allow that Burnham may succeed where Sturgeon did not, it remains the case that Burnhamism already feels and looks like the kind of vibes-and- attitude-based politics Scottish voters have enjoyed — or endured — for the 20 years since the SNP stole Labour’s clothes and became Scotland’s natural party of government. The SNP’s success has been based on crowd-pleasing populism, cushioned by the fact that someone else, somewhere else, will always pick up the bill of final resort. This is Labour’s comfort zone too but the new prime minister is liable to discover that the step up from being a regional power to national office is much
Forbidden fruit always tastes berry delicious
ulberries are, to my mind, the world’s best fruit. Their powerful musky tang is quite different from any other berry. What makes them even more desirable is that they’re too fragile to transport, so I’ve never found them even in the most upmarket of greengrocers. You’ve got to have access to a tree. Lucky us: we have nice neighbours whose tree produces more fruit than they can eat, so my cravings are normally satisfied, but this year they’ve gone away for weeks. Their mulberries are being harvested by hateful fat scavenging pigeons who stuff themselves and then deliberately cover my garden in purple poo. I’ve tried raiding next door’s garden — with their approval, but with no luck. The ladder I borrowed couldn’t quite reach the tree, the trellis started wobbling and my daughter distracted me by telling stories of people left
greater, and harder, than he might have imagined. Modest symbolic gestures on energy prices or business rates for the hospitality sector are just that: tiny nods that offer more in theory than they do in practice. Being mayor of Greater Manchester is a kind of cheat code for politics. Every happy development is your responsibility and every problem is someone else’s fault. Burnham built his reputation by defining himself and his city against them down south. He was One Of Us Up North, untainted by any association with an out of touch and distant Westminster establishment forever indifferent to the north’s interests when it wasn’t busily and actively hostile to them.
power and opposition simultaneously; he can’t
This is something those of us in north Britain have seen before too. London, the giant imperial vampire squid, is an easy target even though, awkwardly, it is London’s tax revenues that subsidise the rest of Britain. There is certainly an argument for economic rebalancing, and greater devolution may well have a part to play in doing so, but the notion that this should come at London’s expense is liable to prove an expensive one. In any case Burnham’s desire to define himself against the centre is likely to wear pretty thin, pretty quickly. Again, this is the difference between being a provincial politician and a national one. The SNP can play this game more effectively than
paraplegic after falling off ladders. So I’ve had to content myself with glaring at the pigeons and dreaming of poisoning them, Tom Lehrer-style, and fertilising my beds with their horrid little corpses. But this weekend, bountiful Nature took pity on me. I went with my sister to visit one of England’s great beauties, the garden at Great Dixter in East Sussex. There was the biggest mulberry tree I’ve seen, heavily laden, dropping its fruit — which, unlike the sea, actually is wine-dark — on the stones beneath. It seemed a shame to let it go to waste, so we picked, ate, and left with our hands red, our clothes stained and our stomachs full. Robot wars I
f further proof were needed that Life of Brian is the greatest-ever work of political philosophy, Elon Musk’s interview with Zanny Minton Beddoes, editor of The Economist, provides it. When Musk describes the sunny uplands of the AI-controlled future, Minton Beddoes asks how that squares with the view he expressed
Burnham. They enjoy structural advantages that are denied any English politician. That is to say, Scottish nationalists can forever “stand up” for what they perceive as the Scottish interest in ways that are not available to a merely Lancastrian figure charged with governing in the interests of all England. Identity politics in Scotland is played on a level that is both higher and broader than that available to a Labour politician from England. The SNP can be in power and opposition simultaneously but that option is no longer available to Burnham. For many years, however, many of Labour’s soft-left supporters have looked north to Scotland with some envy. There they saw a land where undergraduates are not burdened with tuition fees, where medical prescriptions are free and so is travel on the buses for the young and old. Scotland is also a place where welfare provision is markedly more generous than it is in England or Wales. All of this amounts to what the SNP likes to call “Scotland’s unique social contract”. No wonder some Labour supporters look at all of this and wonder why they can’t have something similar elsewhere in the realm. The grubby secret the SNP do not wish to acknowledge is that Caledonian generosity on this scale is only affordable because it is largely funded by fiscal transfers from London and the southeast of England. Scotland is unusual because it is a comparatively wealthy part of the United Kingdom that receives funding commensurate with it being a very poor one. Public spending in and for Scotland is about 25 per cent higher
last year that there was a 10 to 20 per cent chance of killer robots wiping out humanity. “My sort of philosophical conclusion,” says Musk, “is to look on the bright side.” Sharp observers may notice that something has changed since last year. Musk has floated Space X, his AI company, and its value — which, happily, is falling — depends on governments taking a positive view of AI’s consequences for humanity. Musk, however, offers no better grounds for optimism than does the final scene of Life of Brian, in which an endless row of crucifixion victims chorus: “Always look on the bright side of life.” Andy’s snacks W
inston Churchill set the tone for his administration in his first address to parliament: “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.” Margaret Thatcher quoted St Francis of Assisi on the steps of Downing Street. Andy Burnham, who has become prime minister at a time when the nation is
per capita than it is in England and, collectively, amounts to 52 per cent of GDP. By comparison, public spending in Britain as a whole equals 46 per cent of GDP. The Scottish model, then, is not obviously available to England even if it was deemed desirable. Achieving such an outcome would require prohibitive tax increases at a time when the overall tax burden is higher than it has been in more than 60 years. That’s a non-starter. Politics is often pregnant with irony but few are greater than the reality that the SNP’s policy agenda is only possible because of the constitutional architecture the nationalists deplore and exist to dismantle. Scottish independence would cost at least £10 billion a year in tax increases or spending cuts. To put this into some useful context, that is the equivalent of a £100 billion budgetary squeeze for the United Kingdom overall. That qualifies as pretty serious money. Fiscal reality is the rock upon which a vibes-based politician runs aground. Burnham is enjoying a feelgood bounce but this is because he is not Keir Starmer much more than it is because he is Andy Burnham. Financial chickens will soon be coming home to roost. At that point, it will become clear that picking winners inevitably means choosing losers too. Burnham has hitherto benefited from being a Manc Nat, but Downing Street is an unforgiving place and he will soon discover, like his predecessors, that there is no one else to blame for his misfortunes — and looking to the real north will not provide him with the answers he seeks, either.
less obviously in danger than in 1940 but which has a similar vibe to 1979, has made a video in a pub with John Healey in which they discuss their favourite pub snacks. Here’s a man who has just taken power over 70 million people at a critical time, and instead of telling them that they are on the edge of economic disaster he’s giving them handouts and debating Scampi Fries versus pork scratchings with the chancellor. Maybe he’s softening them up for future pain. Maybe it’s the beginning of a campaign for an early election. Or maybe he really is that trivial. Eye for detail I
have a new pin-up – Emily Wilson, translator of the version of The Odyssey that inspired Christopher Nolan. I listened to a long, thoughtful interview in which she spoke at length of choosing the right word to convey the rich meaning of “polytropos”, used in the first sentence to describe Odysseus. The literal translation is “much turning”. Others have opted for “resourceful” and “of many ways”. She went for “complicated”, which she says, with the discontent of a perfectionist, is the worst choice apart from all the other possibilities. Perhaps it’s because public life today is so full of vapid generalities that I so admire a life devoted to precision and nuance.
our nation restore order on the waves Elisabeth Braw T
he oceans are extremely disorderly these days. It’s not just the Strait of Hormuz and the Russian shadow fleet. It’s also China’s maritime rule-breaking in the South China Sea. It’s the Houthis’ attacks on ships. It’s the United States’ unilateral efforts to mine for deep-sea minerals. Someone needs to take charge of restoring order on the oceans. Britain is the country to do it. “Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves!” will once again be the lusty refrain at the Last Night of the Proms, but I bet few audience members will be thinking about the global maritime order. That’s understandable but a shame nonetheless, because the waves are in distress. For generations, misbehaving seafarers have dumped waste into the oceans but in recent years other transgressions have multiplied. China has built islands in parts of the South China Sea that officially belong to other nations, and it habitually bullies other nations’ vessels there. Russia systematically uses its shadow fleet to export sanctioned oil, knowingly exposing Britain and other coastal states to unseaworthy vessels that may even instigate deliberate harm. Indeed, these days Russian navy vessels escort some of these ships. Last week, the Russian navy even conducted a live-fire exercise off the coast of Plymouth. It wasn’t strictly illegal, but it was discourteous — the sort of unbidden visit all countries would hate to receive. Our friend the US, for its part, is embarking on an adventure that will add to maritime disorder. Last spring, President Trump granted US companies permission to mine the seabed in international waters for minerals, contrary to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos). While the US has not ratified Unclos, it has long upheld it. With deep-sea mining, it’s going squarely against this crucial treaty. When major countries proceed like this, why should smaller nations bother with order on the oceans? Because without it, national economies will suffer and so will the oceans’ ecology. For centuries, nations tried to create this very order and in recent decades they succeeded. Now it is slipping away. There’s one country that can lead the world in restoring it: the UK. Britain was once the world’s leading seafaring nation and London is still the world’s maritime hub. What is more, Britain is a trusted interlocutor in international diplomacy and it obeys the treaties it has signed. It is perfectly positioned to gather an alliance of nations committed to order on the oceans. Once it does, the world will discover that virtually every nation favours order. Britannia, restore the governance of the waves!
Fixing our prisons should be top priority Criminal and justice system has long been prey to political opportunism — it’s no wonder that public confidence is low
P
Libby Purves
@lib_thinks
risons are an urgent matter. Not the only one for a renewed government but particularly pressing. It seemed, two years ago, that Sir Keir Starmer recognised this with the appointment of a minister — Lord Timpson — who actually knew about prisons and had productively employed hundreds of former inmates. When the leadership upheaval brought his resignation (much to be regretted) this expert minister could point to improvements made in his time. Rates of self-harm, violence and assaults on staff are down; fewer men are leaving jail with nowhere to go. But our prisons are still at 97 per cent capacity and likely to be physically full within months, so green shoots of recovery run alongside the necessary, but publicly alarming, matter of early releases. It would be good to see Timpson back, but whether or not that ever happens there is urgent work to be done on prison and probation. I know nothing about Catherine
McKinnell, appointed last week by Andy Burnham, but she hardly claims the same deep, clear-eyed knowledge of the system that her predecessor acquired over decades of knowing and rehabilitating ex-inmates. Shockingly, tributes refer to him as “the longest serving prisons minister in 15 years”. That says a great deal about the churn of public office, the canker of frivolous patronage and opportunism in our politics. David Cameron and Theresa May got through three prisons ministers each, Boris Johnson four. Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak made further changes. And we wonder why the justice system never gets proper attention. Or didn’t until Timpson. Meanwhile, two things have developed. One is the curious fact that we send more people to prison than 30 years ago despite a fall in violent crime. Per head of population we lock up twice as many people as most of Europe. This partly accounts for the emergency and the early releases now anxiously suspended by a novice PM. The other pressure-point on criminal justice is the advance of online echo-chamber news, campaigns and propaganda. I can remember a time when a prison sentence was generally seen as a conclusion, the last page of a true-crime saga. The perpetrator is
put away, serving his time. Good riddance. Nothing to see here. That had its disadvantage in causing prison welfare to be ignored but at least it was a full stop. Court decisions, too, were rarely disputed in public: judge and jury did their job, reporters reported, sentence was passed, game over. Inmate education and arts were good causes, accepted albeit grudgingly: supporters risked being dismissed as bleeding-heart softies. When I spoke about prison arts at both major party conferences it was
often use the voices of victims as tinder
Labour MPs who were dismissive. Tories (perhaps impressed by Jonathan Aitken) seemed a bit more receptive. Now in the age of anxiety a public deluged with unfiltered stories is regularly whipped into indignation about both sentencing and incarceration. Recently we had the furore about teenage boys convicted of two rapes being spared jail to avoid “unnecessary criminalisation”, and several cases of asylum seekers from misogynistic cultures being spared prison for sexual molestation. There was Shaun McKenna too,
who raped a child at a campsite but got only three years community payback because he now has the brain disorder Huntington’s disease, which couldn’t be supervised in prison. There’s anger as well about early release, both from the family of PC Andrew Harper and from the many victims of domestic abuse and rape who now risk seeing their assailants free after a third of their sentences. Any irresponsible campaigner can use the sorrowful voices of victims as tinder, inflamed by an avid media as they grieve and — understandably for a time at least — wish elaborate harshness on those who hurt them. Most inflammatory of all is the revelation that Axel Rudakubana, the Southport child-murderer, has been moved to Broadmoor mental hospital. In a disgraceful video on TikTok and X, Zia Yusuf of Reform — the party’s “shadow home secretary”, God help us — claims heartfelt feeling for the victims’ families, gleefully declaring British justice has been broken by this transfer. He displays faux horror pictures of Broadmoor with “leisure centre”-type comfy chairs and surfs happily along on the sorrow of the victims’ families and the cost to the taxpayer. He leads an easy chorus of assumption that Rudakubana is somehow cheating: faking it, deceiving experienced psychiatrists to game the system and get to those comfy chairs.
The voice of the victim matters. We acknowledge this in the VPS — victim personal statement — new this century. After a verdict it is designed to clarify the harm caused and offer some closure. But, crucially, it cannot demand a particular sentence. That is the court’s job: emotion is important but it is not evidence. There is an appeals procedure — in the case of the Fordingbridge teenage rapists this increased their sentence — but in the interests of civilisation we step away from the primitivism of cowboy revenge or sharia victim-power. We hand the duty of punishment to the law. That can feel hard on those who suffer, and sometimes justice shows cracks. But it is a bedrock of safety and order. Take Yusuf’s dreadful Rudakubana rant, and what would happen if such fools had power. They’d blithely ignore a century’s careful, expert evolution of Mental Health Acts on a whim, just to please a public in shock from a rare atrocity and make themselves look strong. They’d breezily deny the human reality of mental disorders and condemn prison officers to deal, in hard-pressed daily routine, with inmates diagnosed as psychotically dangerous. Exploiting innocent grief and public outrage is not democracy. It is a threat to the rule of law, hence to us all.
Sir, The response to No 10 North (letters, Jul 25) does not take into account the economic growth and geographical position of Greater Manchester. The flat-cap, clog- wearing, racing pigeon-keeping image has long since disappeared and we are not characters in an LS Lowry painting. Manchester’s historical, cultural and economic contribution to the UK should not be underestimated. It is the fastest- growing city-region economy outside London, sustaining a 3.1 per cent annual economic growth rate in excess of ten years. John Fitzgerald Droylsden, Manchester
Sir, As Andy Burnham is operating his government from two centres, does this mean that MPs who work in both Manchester and London will need two homes as well as the ones in their constituencies? There will, of course, also be claims for rail fares. Vanessa Mitchell Calverton, Bucks
Sir, Is there a Chequers of the North for the weekend, and where is it? Stephen Hammerton Bath
Sir, Andy Burnham truly is a man of the people. In establishing No 10 North, he, like office workers across the land, has successfully manufactured a spurious reason to work from home on a Friday. Samuel Casey London SW6
Sir, What makes Peter Steggles (letter, Jul 25) think that pigeon racing is a particularly northern pastime? Queen Elizabeth kept pigeons at Sandringham, and the headquarters of the Royal Pigeon Racing Association is in Gloucestershire. Peter J Robinson Wakefield, W Yorks
clarifications
6 In a headline and a leading article we said migrant care workers were each bringing up to 15 family members with them (News, Comment, Jul 7). This was incorrect. The ratio of 15 to 1 was that of new visa approvals for Cameroonian care workers to visa approvals for family members of all Cameroonian care workers already in the UK in 2025-26. The same applies to arrivals from Ghana, Bangladesh and India. There is no connection between new visa approvals for care workers, who are not allowed to bring any dependants at all, and visas issued to the family members of care workers who were here already.
The Times takes complaints about editorial content seriously. We are committed to abiding by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (“IPSO”) rules and regulations and the Editors’ Code of Practice that IPSO enforces. Requests for corrections or clarifications should be sent by email to feedback@thetimes.co.uk or by post to Feedback, The Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF
Sir, The story about the risks of renewable energy in the UK (“Net zero risks blackouts”, Jul 25) was juxtaposed with a picture showing a blood-orange sky caused by runaway fires in southwestern France. The threats posed by the ongoing use of fossil fuels and their link to climate breakdown are existential. There are significantly greater dangers presented by non-renewable energy compared with renewable. Dr Andrew Davis Bicester, Oxon
Sir, No one should suggest that net zero should be beyond criticism. The costs, pace and practicalities of the transition deserve rigorous scrutiny. Your analysis discussed the “reliability” of fossil fuels in meeting electricity demand, yet did not acknowledge the growing risks of remaining dependent on them. Reliability is not measured solely by whether the lights stay on, but also by whether the climate remains liveable. John Mullen London N4
Sir, The problems with the grid are not caused by the transition to net zero. They are caused by the
Conserving water install grey-water systems to take the burden off drinking-water supplies. Dr John Ashton Woolton, Liverpool
Sir, Tony Jones’s proposal (letter, Jul 25) to flush the lavatory less often under a “drought regime” confuses water use with water consumption. Most domestic water is not lost. After treatment, it is returned to rivers, often becoming another community’s water supply downstream. Reducing household demand therefore also reduces these return flows. Similarly, much leakage eventually replenishes groundwater rather than disappearing. Britain’s water challenge is less about using less water than about managing it in the right place at the right time. Melvyn Kay Water resources management consultant; Rushden, Northants
Sir, Tony Jones flagged an important issue which could offer us a benefit equivalent to the construction of many new reservoirs. I refer to the use of grey water from our roofs for bathing and flushing the lavatory in lieu of wasting drinking-quality water. The French discovered the value of dual systems of water supply in the 19th century. Surely all new buildings should be immediately required to
PLAYWRIGHT IS CENSORED
from the times july 27, 1926
Mr Bernard Shaw, in celebration of his 70th birthday, was the guest of members of the Parliamentary Labour Party at a dinner given at the Hotel Metropole last night. Mr Ramsay MacDonald MP presided, and proposed the health of Mr Shaw. He said they thought that on such an occasion the whole country would like to hear Mr Shaw that night, but, unfortunately, it was not the British Broadcasting Company that settled such matters, but the Government. Owing to the smallness of mind of the Government and an incapacity to
transition being poorly managed, and by decades of underinvestment in the underlying infrastructure, especially the need to invest in a network which can manage the fluctuations in output that are inherent in renewable sources. Other nations invested, and we did not. Germany, for instance, is able to integrate far more diverse energy generation sources, with a much lower risk of the kind of issues we faced this summer. However, all is not lost: to use a suitably net-zero metaphor, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now. Smart grids would let us stop cars charging at times of peak demand (or even feed back into the grid at such times), while making the connecting of new, small-scale energy sources (such as plug-in solar) far less risky. Charles Bradford Bovington, Dorset
Sir, The legal treatment of the Rosebank oilfield exposes a serious inconsistency in Britain’s climate policy. Rosebank’s original approval was quashed because the environmental assessment had not included the emissions produced when its oil and gas were eventually
Sir, For decades I have been disposing of my urine on the compost heap; it is rich in nitrogen so improves the compost and saves water. Bring back the chamber pot. Lisle Ryder Appleby-in-Westmorland, Cumbria
Sir, In the Caribbean, every lavatory has a sign: “If it is yellow, let it mellow — if it is brown, flush it down.” Suneel Amin London NW9
Sir, Fraser Nelson claims the prime minister has used Brexit powers to reduce VAT on electricity (“Starmer had a good story, but it’s Burnham’s to tell”, Jul 25). Burnham has that power only in Great Britain and not in Northern Ireland. No British prime minister or parliament can do so, courtesy of the Windsor framework and the preceding Northern Ireland protocol conceded by previous
gauge what was in the hearts of the people Mr. Shaw was not being broadcast that night. Mr Shaw said that the public had most alarmingly been treating him as a great man. They all knew that he was an extraordinarily clever fellow at his job, but he had not got the great man feeling. Referring to the fact that his speech that evening was not being broadcast, Mr Shaw went on to say that there was no objection to him except that he was known to be a supporter of His Majesty’s Opposition. Therefore, the Government, in the simplicity of their souls, thought that all supporters of the Opposition ought to be suppressed. They took the very serious step of denying freedom of speech in his case, which would probably be denied in many other cases presently. The right of free speech was not the right to state in public that there were no milestones on the Dover Road, but the right of
burnt. Yet no equivalent assessment is required when the same fuels are imported from Norway, the United States or the Middle East. If demand remains unchanged, restricting domestic production does not eliminate emissions. It merely transfers production, investment, employment and tax revenues overseas, while increasing dependence on imports and potentially adding transport emissions. However, this is not an argument against reducing fossil-fuel use. Britain must reduce demand through electrification, energy efficiency and cleaner alternatives. Tim Williams Aberdeen
Sir, That the race to net zero “risks blackouts and higher bills” should come as no surprise. It is clear that renewables provide no energy security. The government needs to act at pace to build more gas-fired power stations using our North Sea gas while investing in large-scale proven nuclear power stations. Both provide dependable power, the key component of any successful economy. Ian Ross London SE25
Conservative administrations. There is a tendency among politicians of all parties to overlook the needs of our country as a whole. Paul Kernaghan Nassington, Cambs
Sir, Bus budgets are scrawny in rural counties (“Burnham raids climate project funds to pay for £2 bus fare cap”, Jul 23). Services, fares and information need to be brought together under one network rather than having isolated routes kept alive by subsidy, fragmented among a dozen operators. People in rural areas are often unable to reach work, medical appointments, shops or friends by bus. In Shropshire, which has more sheep than people, we need a Sheep Network that can deliver the change integrated bus networks are bringing to cities such as Manchester. Andy Boddington Ludlow, Shropshire
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speaking controversially — which was at the basis of all Parliamentary Governments. (Cheers.) When he began, Labour was attached to Liberalism and to Radicalism. Afterwards the Labour Party stated definitely that what had to be done was to make theirs a constitutional party. That was why the present Government were so much more afraid of the Labour Party than they were of those fine old republican Radicals. (Laughter.) The present Government was always interfering with capitalism and making all sorts of regulations which were breaking up their own system. If private property stood in the way of distribution it would have to go. They must get seriously to work to get a technique of Government, so that they would be ready when the time came.
Sir, Mike Atherton’s article regarding the Ashes series next summer (“Ashes snub for North is unfair and betrays the game’s heritage”, Jul 24) is absolutely correct. Southampton doesn’t have the tradition or atmosphere of Headingley or Old Trafford. How can the ECB not hold an Ashes Test match in the heartland of English cricket? Andy High Tittleshall, Norfolk
Sir, In cricket the mark of a great all rounder is the difference between their Test batting average and their Test bowling average. The great Gary Sobers (obituary, Jul 18) had a batting average of 57.78 and a bowling average of 34.03, a difference of 23.75. However, in all the recent tributes to him, no mention has been made of the player with a better Test batting average (59.88) and a better bowling average (16.62), a difference of 43.26. Admittedly the second player scored only 1,078 runs and took only 50 wickets — but then women play significantly fewer Test matches than men. Was Enid Bakewell a greater all- rounder than Gary Sobers? Tony Elgood MCC treasurer, 2017-23; Winford, Somerset
Sir, US cryptanalysts were not the only ones to attempt to crack Russian codes in the 1940s (“Can we crack Russia’s Cold War codes?”, Jul 25). German agencies understandably did likewise, and with some success. The UK-US joint TICOM1 team confirmed this during their visit to Bavaria in the closing days of the war in Europe. My father (Major Edward Rushworth, a Bletchley Park-based officer) was one of those interviewing German opposite numbers and hence discovered that key kit, including a Lorenz machine, had been buried in the main square of Rosenheim. This and several vehicles packed with kit (including an intercept station), documents and prisoners were transported to the UK where they contributed to the capabilities that the UK and US agencies developed during the Cold War. Professor Dame Helen Wallace London SW17
Sir, I have been a lifelong aficionado of the Times crossword. However, I was concerned to note that Jenny Kenyon (letter, Jul 24) appears to be resorting to a source of reference while trying to solve the puzzle. In my book, this is cheating. For me, a crossword cannot be said to have been properly and successfully completed unless this is achieved purely from one’s own knowledge and inspiration, without reference to the dictionary, encyclopaedia, Google or — far, far worse — AI. Am I alone in this? Nicholas Pennington Addingham, W Yorks
Sir, Heather Willson (letter, Jul 23) proudly embraces her short hair, even if it is considered out of fashion. I grew a very unfashionable beard in 1973, and now? In the 1980s I had three unfashionable Jack Russell terriers and now? What goes round comes round. Rev Allan Campbell-Wilson Scarborough, N Yorks
Daily Universal Register
UK: Hustings for the Greater Manchester mayoral election. Europe: Vodafone Group, Audi and LVMH results.
Nature notes
The common octopus is increasing in numbers in UK waters, particularly in shallower areas around the coasts of Devon and Cornwall, with rising sea temperatures thought to be part of the reason for the ongoing “bloom”. These highly intelligent, shapeshifting creatures are excellent at solving problems; small wonder they’ve developed a knack for targeting crustaceans and shellfish caught in lobster pots, squeezing in, paralysing them with venom and eating them before they can be brought to land and eaten instead by us. Common octopus are usually brownish and warty, although they can change their skin’s colour and even texture in seconds. Specialised cells contract and relax when directed by nerve impulses, allowing pigments to appear and bumps to form. melissa harrison
Birthdays today
Tom Kerridge, pictured, chef, restaurateur and TV presenter, Secrets of the Pub Kitchen (2024- 25), 53; Allan Border, Australian cricketer and sports commentator, 71; Sir Christopher Dean, ice skater, Olympic gold medallist (1984), 68; Bob Diamond, banker, chief executive, Barclays (2011-12), 75; Jo Durie, tennis player, seven-time British national singles champion, 66; David Edwards, chief executive, Royal Aeronautical Society, 50; Bobbie Gentry, singer, Ode to Billie Joe (1967), 84; Sir Demis Hassabis, AI researcher and neuroscientist, co-recipient of the Nobel prize in chemistry (2024, “for protein structure prediction”), 50; Lord (Michael) Hintze, founder of CQS (asset management), 73; General Sir James Hockenhull, commander, UK Strategic Command (2022- Mar 2026), 62; Cressida Hogg, chairwoman, Confederation of British Industry, BAE Systems (aerospace, defence and information security), 57; Simon Jones, actor, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1981), 76; Jonathan Rhys Meyers, actor, The Tudors (2007-10), 49; Lord (Mark) Pack, president of the Liberal Democrats (2020-25), 56; Robert Rankin, novelist, Snuff Fiction (1999), 77; Pete Reed, rower, three-time Olympic gold medallist (2008, 2012, 2016), 45; Jonty Rhodes, cricketer, South Africa (1992-2003), 57; Jordan Spieth, golfer, winner of the Open (2017), 33; Dame Emily Thornberry (Lady Nugee), Labour MP for Islington South Finsbury, shadow attorney-general (2021-24), 66; Air Chief Marshal Sir Glenn Torpy DSO, chief of the air staff (2006-09), 73; Prof Stephen Westaby, heart surgeon, writer, The Trauma Chronicles (2023), 78; Joy Whitby, pioneer of children’s television, Play School (1964), Jackanory (1965), 96; Thomas Young, sprinter, Paralympic gold medallist (2020, T38 event), 26.
On this day
In 1921 Toronto University researchers led by the biochemist Frederick Banting announced the discovery of the hormone insulin.
The last word
A hasty push for net zero has raised risks and costs to consumers. Yet the government continues to irresponsibly pretend the transition is easy and costless
Britain’s energy policies aggravate the risk of blackouts and put upward pressure on electricity bills. This is not some mere partisan allegation. As we reported on Saturday, it is the judgment of a confidential report commissioned by the national grid operator, the National Energy System Operator (Neso). The issue exemplifies one of the most damaging misapprehensions of present government thinking, namely that all desirable goals are readily compatible and there are no trade-offs in pursuing them. Labour hence appears to have given scant thought to the real-world implications for consumers and businesses of an ambitious target for net-zero carbon emissions. Cornwall Insight, a consultancy, paints a dis- turbing picture of Britain’s energy preparedness in its report. Neso, formerly part of National Grid and now publicly owned, can’t reliably predict supply and demand for energy. The push for net zero has expanded the role of wind farms, solar panels and batteries, encompassing thousands of small providers that do not directly engage with Neso. This fragmentation of the supply side has “reduced visibility of the capacity which is supply- ing and taking power from the GB network”. The dangers highlighted by the report are far from merely hypothetical. Neso documents
The resignation of India’s education minister over exam leaks is a reckoning for Modi
Narendra Modi, the Indian prime minister, is being confronted by a mounting youth rebellion on the streets of Delhi. This culminated at the weekend in the resignation of his education minister, Dhar- mendra Pradhan. Mr Pradhan had been identified by student protesters as morally responsible for a corruption scandal dating back to May in which examination papers for India’s highly competitive medical school entrance test had been leaked. Undoubtedly to Mr Modi’s discomfort, the protesters’ cause has become emblematic of broader political discontent felt by India’s youth. Grievances over university exams may hardly seem the stuff of which big political uprisings are made. But in India the scandal has tapped into a wider perception of declining opportunity and malaise. Exam leaks have become routine in the past decade and no officials have yet been held accountable. For young Indians the sense of un- fairness rankles given that academic success is increasingly seen as the only means to financial security and social mobility. Many young students face a punishing sched- ule, working as many as 14 hours a day. India’s
Younger Britons are discovering the fortifying powers of the national beverage
Tea was brought to this country by Asterix the Gaul in around 50BC. It proved to be a source of strength for ancient Britons resisting Roman imperialism who mistakenly imagined they had imbibed magic potion brewed by Asterix’s confrere, the druid Getafix. Though there is oddly no further reference to tea in any historical source relating to these islands until the 17th century, the effects are immediately recognisable. It instilled courage in our forebears, and is now helping younger Britons face such daunting occasions as job interviews and first dates with confidence. Survey evidence suggests that almost half of
obtained by The Times indicate that the grid re- peatedly breached operational safety constraints on June 23, during the recent heatwave. In short, the danger of blackouts was material. Among the contributory factors was forecasting error on Neso’s part, and government policy contributed to this failure. Neso must constantly keep its calcula- tions of electricity supply and demand updated, yet forecasts are rendered more difficult if energy providers are disaggregated, and any resulting un- anticipated shortfall is far more expensive to fill. According to a whistleblower who provided us with the report, Neso was “flying blind” in the heatwave. The uncertainties of energy supply have raised the risk of Neso having to procure energy at short notice at higher prices than it might have been able to pay in advance in whole- sale markets. Inevitably, that shortfall is paid for by households and businesses through their bills. The risk of blackouts and rising costs are the predictable outcome of a government policy that fails to take account of the trade-offs required in a speedy transition to renewables. The facts of climate change and of the necessity of curbing emissions are not disputed by responsible critics. But the costs of mitigating the first and achieving the second are not so easily wished away.
medical school entrance exam, among the coun- try’s most gruelling, is taken by about 2.3 million people a year, competing for only 136,000 places. When this year’s papers were leaked, a cohort was faced with the ordeal of resitting the exam, a deci- sion since linked to about a dozen suicides. Indeed, in the decade to 2024, student suicides in India have risen by 80 per cent. A combination of hubris and detachment from the concerns of India’s younger voters has led the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Mr Modi’s Hindu nationalist governing party, to underestimate the resentment directed at it. Mr Pradhan dismissed youth protesters as a “B team of terrorists”. The movement that ousted him adopted its name, the Cockroach Janta Party (a play on the BJP’s name), from another incautious insult by Mr Modi’s allies. On this occasion, the BJP’s favoured tactics of harsh denunciation and brutal crackdowns have not succeeded. Over the past two months, hun- dreds of thousands of protesters have marched on Delhi. Heavy-handed official responses, including repeated tear-gassing, beatings, the use of pellet guns and an attempt to suppress movement by
Generation Z, the demographic born from 1997 to 2012, reach for a cup of tea to steady their nerves before such moments. It is a historically well- founded as well as abstemious choice. It is a truism that tea is a national beverage but the degree to which it is entrenched in British tastes is some- times not fully appreciated. The first teahouse in Britain was established in 1640, well before the first coffeehouse. And within 200 years, most of those coffeehouses had been consigned to history. Tea, meanwhile, had pro- gressed from a luxury to a staple. And that it has remained. In this nation’s darkest hour, during the
Renewables have drawbacks. The power they supply is intermittent; hence the requirement to maintain gas turbines to fill the shortfalls identi- fied by the report to Neso. Much of that power, no- tably as generated by wind, is generated regionally and then needs to be transported elsewhere by means of infrastructure with a high capital cost. Nor have the costs of renewables fallen, as their cheerleaders imagined would inevitably happen. Energy provision during the heatwave is being reviewed by Ofgem, the regulator. What is beyond dispute is that the complexity of the supply side for electricity generation is a matter of documented concern for energy experts. As Sir Dieter Helm of Oxford University has noted: “The problem for Neso is it means admitting [renewables are] going to cost a lot more, and that doesn’t fit with the story that it’s all going to be cheaper because we’re going to have renewables.” For policymakers, especially the Labour gov- ernment, the lessons are dispiriting but clear. Net zero is neither a free lunch nor a deus ex machina. It is a goal whose attainment will impose real costs, and whose benefits are at this stage more specula- tive than real. Balancing the energy sources of the future with those of the present is more sensible than climate utopianism.
shutting down 17 metro stations and blocking mobile data, were all used to no avail. Co-ordinated by a nimble social media operation, protests only intensified. In acceding to the protesters’ central demand that Mr Pradhan be removed, the Indian government has bowed to the inevitable. How far this failure to suppress dissent has dam- aged Mr Modi’s authority remains uncertain. In his 12 years in office, he has often relied on projec- ting an ideologically unbending persona. How- ever, this summer’s protests, which have united a broad political cross-section of India’s youth, con- centrated on questioning his government’s under- lying competence rather than its values. Its de- mands met, the Cockroach movement has sig- nalled that demonstrators should now stand down peacefully, suggesting an end to any immediate challenge to Mr Modi’s standing. But student movements have prompted wider upheaval in Indian politics before. The speed and ease with which the Cockroach movement has secured its aims will have disconcerted a govern- ment too accustomed to facing down popular opposition with indifference.
Second World War, coffee was never rationed but tea was restricted to an allowance of two ounces per adult each week. There is undoubtedly a tradition of scepticism about this country’s cuisine. Grimod de la Reyni- ère, the French gastronome, wrote dismissively in 1806 that “English cooking is limited to boiled chickens of extreme insipidity”. And perhaps there was once a time when we relished boiled meat accompanied by vegetables that were far from al dente. But the meal was always enlivened with a cup of tea to finish. New generations are dis- covering the potency of that mix.
24 S1 Monday July 27 2026 | the times World
Tehran is crucial, insists Netanyahu
United States
David Charter Washington
David Charter
Binyamin Netanyahu urged President Trump not to abandon regime change in Tehran before a White House meet- ing tomorrow as the United States and Iran paused hostilities after almost two weeks of attacks. The Israeli prime minister said the conflict could end only with the fall of the regime or a clear change of course as he prepared for his first meeting with Trump since the US and Israel launched their military campaign on February 28. US officials denied reports that Trump had halted US airstrikes on Fri- day because of warnings from his gen- erals that escalation would deplete stocks of defensive munitions for US bases and allies to critically low levels. There were also reports that an oil tanker exploded in the Strait of Hor- muz yesterday after hitting a mine, highlighting the perilous situation in the vital shipping channel as the US continued to blockade Iranian vessels. Analysts said the US and Israel had in- creasingly divergent aims, as Netanyahu sought greater damage to the Iranian regime with one eye on his re-election chances in the Israeli general election in October, and Trump seeks an exit strat- egy as November’s midterm elections loom. Asked by Fox News what it would take to end the war, Netanyahu men- tioned Iranian regime change several times despite Trump’s repeated insist- ence that this was not a war goal. “I think it will take for Iran to under- stand, either for this regime to fall or for Iran to realise that the cost of wreaking economic chaos to the world, murder- ing thousands of its own citizens and shooting at everyone … I think when this regime is either toppled or it’s suffi- ciently weakened that it knows it has to end its nuclear programme and has to change its course,” Netanyahu said. Netanyahu is due to fly to Washington today to attend the funeral of Lindsey Graham, a pro-Israel Republican sena- tor, enabling him to meet Trump after several earlier attempts were rebuffed by the White House amid worsening relations between the two leaders. Trump confirmed last month reports that they held an expletive-laden phone exchange about Israel’s continu- ing attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon that undermined attempts at a cease- fire in the Gulf. Trump admitted he called Netanyahu “f***ing crazy”. Trump ordered a halt on Friday to 13 consecutive nights of US attacks on Iranian targets, reportedly after Gener- al Dan Caine, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, warned this could dan- gerously deplete missile interceptors in the region that protect US bases and allies, The New York Times said. JD Vance, the vice-president, and
Perry objects to song use
The pop star Katy Perry said she was “deeply appalled and angry” that her song Firework was used in a White House TikTok post about bombs exploding in Iran. Perry, who is in a relationship with the former Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, posted that she wrote the 2010 hit as an “anthem of hope, healing, and inner strength for people going through their darkest personal moments” and “absolutely do not condone” its use for “footage of military strikes”. The clip is the latest in a series of White House postings featuring scenes of destruction in Iran set to music and carried the caption: “Iran has been warned.” Perry, 41, joins a long list of performers who have objected to President Trump’s use of their music, including Ariana Grande who last month asked “Please do not use my music in relation to this barbaric, inhumane, heinous nonsense” when her 2024 track Bye was used to accompany a montage of immigration agents detaining people, with the caption “Bye-bye. President Trump has delivered the most secure border in history”. The music was removed. After Perry’s post, Kaelan Dorr, the White House principal deputy communications director, posted a clip of the video for her 2012 song Part of Me showing the singer in military fatigues training with the Marines. Dorr wrote: “This you?”
Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law who is acting as a Middle East envoy, both reportedly called for restraint to allow peace talks. Mike Waltz, the US ambassador to the UN, denied that key weapons stock- piles had been depleted in the Middle East. “The president is keeping all op- tions on the table,” he told NBC News. Trump “is giving the talks some space”. Iran said it had stopped attacking tar- gets in the region because the US had stopped shooting. An army spokesman, Mohammad Akraminia, said: “Since ... our strategy has essentially been retalia- tory, we have also halted our retaliatory operations.” Daniel Shapiro, a former US ambas- sador to Israel and a fellow of the Atlan- tic Council think tank, said US and Israeli interests and objectives had been diverging from a modest gap to a “chasm” that would not be easy to bridge. “When the war began, each side har- boured hope that the Iranian regime would collapse,” Shapiro said. “But when it became clear the regime could endure significant military blows and inflict painful retaliation against US military and Gulf state infrastructure targets, President Trump understood that enough was enough and has been searching for an off-ramp ever since. “Prime minister Netanyahu, mean- while, operates according to the post- October 7 Israeli ethos that threats to Israel must be dealt with proactively and cannot be allowed to fester.” Trump is also expected to meet President Zelensky tomorrow when he arrives in Washington for Graham’s funeral. Zelensky said on Saturday that he had evidence of Russian assistance for Tehran that would be shared with the Americans. “Since the beginning of July, we have recorded active Russian satellite sur- veillance of the Gulf states and US mili- tary facilities located there. These images subsequently appear in Iran. At the same time, there is a clear correla- tion between Russia’s satellite im- agery of these sites and Iranian strikes — both before the attacks, in preparation for them and afterward, to assess the damage inflicted,” he said. When Trump was asked on Friday about Pete Hegseth, the US war sec- retary, telling Congress last week that China and Russia were “enabling” Iran, Trump said “I think I trust” the word of both President Xi and President Putin that they are not aiding Iran because “I don’t think they want to have me disappointed”.
suspect shot dead
Germany
Ella Joyner
An Islamist suspected of a fatal car-ramming and stabbing attack during Berlin’s Pride festival has been shot dead by German police. Officers tracked Abdul Ballout, a 21- year-old German man of Lebanese her- itage, to an allotment in the northwest of the capital after a day-long manhunt. “He is believed to have run towards our officers armed with a bladed weap- on, whereupon [they] were forced to open fire,” Berlin police said. “Despite resuscitation efforts being initiated immediately by the Berlin Fire Brigade, he died at the scene.” Earlier in the day, Germany’s interior minister said the suspect had links to the “Islamist scene”. Alexander Dobrindt said at the scene of the attack in the Tiergarten park: “Everything we’re seeing here points to an Islamist terror attack.” One woman was killed and 29 people
were injured when Ballout allegedly drove a van into a crowd near the festival, before getting out and attack- ing them with what may have been a machete, Dobrindt said. It emerged yesterday that Ballout travelled to the Middle East last year in an unsuccessful attempt to join Islamic State. He was then convicted of “pre- paring a serious act of violence that threatens the security of the state”. He had been arrested in Lebanon before being returned to Germany, where he received a suspended sen- tence of one year and ten months. He had previous convictions in 2022 for assault and robbery. Hundreds of thousands of people had gathered in the German capital for the annual parade on Saturday, known as Christopher Street Day, which is one of Europe’s largest Pride festivals. The attack occurred at about 10pm near Lennestrasse in the western Tier- garten area. Witnesses reported seeing
S1 25
wounds. The parade was immediately cancelled and the word “evacuation” was displayed in bright colours on the Brandenburg Gate. LGBT groups organised vigils across the city yesterday. On Pariser Platz in front of the Brandenburg Gate, crowds gathered to lay flowers and Pride rain- bow flags in solidarity with the victims. Friedrich Merz, the chancellor, attended a memorial service at the Marienkirche in central Berlin, where the rainbow flag was draped over the altar. He said: “These acts have only one purpose. They want to divide our society. They want to take the most important thing we have — our open- ness and our freedom.” Before Ballout was shot, a police spokesman, Florian Nath, said several people had been interviewed in con- nection with the incident, “some of whom we have held or are holding in custody”. Police also referred to “one or possibly several people” who left the van after the attack. Germany has suffered several similar attacks in recent years. In May this year, two were killed and six injured when a car was driven into a busy shopping district in Leipzig. In February, a man drove a car into a protest in Munich, killing two people, including a toddler,
Flowers were placed
at the Brandenburg
Gate in Berlin after
the attack during the
Christopher Street
Day Pride parade on
2024, a man drove into a Christmas market in Magdeburg, killing six people and injuring 300. Raphael Bossong from the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) said it was clear that there was a pattern, but that such inci- dents were difficult to prevent. “We all use cars and you can’t do every back- ground check on every person who rents a car. This is something we cannot
RALF HIRSCHBERGER/AFP/GETTY IMAGES; CHRISTIAN MANG/REUTERS
Saturday. The
vehicle was driven
towards people
before it struck a
tree. An attacker
then used a bladed
German broadcaster Deutsche Welle. Not all such attacks had taken place in Germany, he said, pointing to similar attacks in France and elsewhere, and not all had been Islamist. LGBT groups warned against exploiting the incident for political gain, while politicians across the spec- trum called for unity. Tino Chrupalla, the leader of the hard-right Alternative for Germany party, wrote on X: “We won’t let reli- gious intolerance and extremism divide our country.” Wes Streeting, the British defence secretary, was among politicians to condemn the attack. He called it “abso- lutely horrific” and said his thoughts and prayers went to the people of Berlin and across Germany. Speaking on Sky News, Streeting said such attacks were “becoming far too common”. “In many respects, things are different and better now than they’ve ever been … but hate crimes are also on the rise. There are lots of people who don’t accept diversity and difference in our society. And that’s why Pride is a celebration. But it’s also a protest against those who do not accept life in the 21st century, do not accept people loving each other in same-sex relationships and in the very worst cases would seek to do us harm.”
weapon to continue
the rampage. Abdul
Ballout, below, was
yesterday killed by
police searching for
the attacker
Ebola claims thousandth life Page 26
down to earth by the Cockroaches
prime minister has been made to look old and out of touch, writes Amrit Dhillon in Delhi
Narendra Modi looked tired, out of touch and, unusually for such a con- summate politician, outwitted. Even his last-ditch effort via social media to placate the youth movement that had risen up to challenge his government fell victim to mockery. Posted at midnight on Thursday, he assured students in a short clip that he was taking action over the leak of examination papers that triggered widespread protests from India’s Gen Z. Many made fun of him on Instagram for posing alarmingly close to the camera, his face filling the screen. Reels showed people cleaning their homes during the long pauses between sen- tences that characterise his speech. “Let’s not take a year to move on to the next sentence,” one reel said. India has not seen such protests for decades. They were prompted by the leak in May of a national medical schools exam paper, forcing two mil- lion students to resit the exam. Rising anger among India’s students and young unemployed led to the launch of the Cockroach Janta Party, a move- ment that took its name from a remark by India’s top judge likening some unemployed to cockroaches. Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were taken by surprise at the speed with which protests spread and the mass sit- in at Jantar Mantar, in Delhi. Crowds called for the education minister Dharmendra Pradhan to resign over the leak. It quickly became the biggest challenge to Modi’s premiership since he took office in 2014. Political analysts say an arrogant BJP misread the situation, leading to a series of mistakes. At first, ministers ignored the protests. Then they denounced those taking part as propa- gandists and anarchists. Ministers also refused to express regret over the dozen students who reportedly killed them- selves at the prospect of resitting the exam. Some of their parents partici- pated in the protest. Many Indians, including BJP sup- porters, were also shocked by the level of police violence against the protest- ers in Delhi, which included baton charges and tear gas. A rattled Modi belatedly sacri- ficed his education minister on Saturday and offered a package of concessions, including fast- track courts to punish those responsible for exam leaks. “The BJP had no idea of the pro-
was a gunrunner for Japan Page 28
would take,” Sandeep Shastri, a political analyst based in Bangalore, said. “They thought they could contain it in the same way as other protests.” The ruling party had ample reason to believe it could ride out the storm. For 12 years, Modi has appeared unassail- able. His party had one electoral vic- tory after another and turned into a hegemon that runs 22 of India’s 28 states. But analysts say that beneath the sur- face, an undercurrent of public disen- chantment has been growing, a sense that life is not getting better. “The truth is that millions of middle- class Indians were lulled into a false sense of security by the new roads, highways, ports and airports that have been built in the past 12 years but now they have noticed that these have not benefited them personally,” Tavleen Singh wrote in The Indian Express. Since Modi came to power, India’s GDP has grown by an average of 6.5 per cent each year. It now amounts to $4.15 trillion, making it the fourth larg- est economy in the world after the US, China and Germany. But weak jobs growth is a worry for many Indians: university graduates make up 60 per cent of the unemployed. The analyst Arati Jerath said: “It [BJP] had become too arrogant, too remote from the people, but didn’t realise it. What’s been building up is anger at its authoritarian style, at the fear it’s created. Young Indians are reclaiming their right to express themselves.” Ashutosh Ranka, for the Cockroach party, said: “Are our leaders gods? I thought in a democracy they were meant to answer to us, the voters?” Until now, Modi had made it a matter of principle never to sack a minister in case it was seen as weakness. As far back as 2015, the defence minister Rajnath Singh said that unlike previous governments, “our ministers do not resign”. Many young people in India do not share their parents’ respect for the rul- ing institutions. They are irreverent, rebellious and prepared to make fun of the “aunties and uncles” in power. It was this failure to grasp the nature of Gen Z that resulted in Modi’s climb- down. Ministers thought the protest would fizzle out. Instead, pro- testers doubled down and, through social media, mobilised more and more support. As they celebrated Pradhan’s resignation on Saturday, one student who had travelled from Madras shrugged his shoulders. “This could have been avoided if ministers had agreed to talk to us,” Vijay Rai said. “What was so difficult about that?”
Monday July 27 2026 | the times World
Glow with the flow Rafts wend their way along the Yulong River during the Golden Dragon Parade, an ancient Chinese tradition, in the Guangxi autonomous region
Ebola claims thousandth life
scale of the outbreak is far larger, Noella Mwanzi in Bunia and Jane Flanagan write
inside their homes with their Ebola dead until burial teams arrive with body bags and coffins. The wait can last days: the nearest town is 15 miles away down a mud track in an area long fought over by militia. Overseeing the quarantines and grim rites is Lalu’s chief, Mayalibo Drajima, who has witnessed dozens of deaths in recent weeks, including two of his relatives. “At the moment I am keeping a family of ten quarantining in their house with a body,” he said in a call from the village in eastern Congo. “Persuad- ing them to stay there is difficult and sometimes they refuse, even though they are dangerous to others.” Like many communities in the east- ern Democratic Republic of Congo, where health officials say Ebola is spreading “like wildfire”, Lalu is cut off from specialist care. There is little safe water for handwashing and no protective equipment. “I bought chlorine with my own money to mix in a watering can and spray it over the yard and every- where that is infected,” Drajima, 33, said. The number of con- firmed Ebola cases has passed 3,000, ten weeks after the out- break was declared on
Mayalibo
persuading
Lalu
DEMOCRATIC
REPUBLIC OF
fastest-growing epidemic on record. The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention put the death toll at 1,031. By comparison, the West African epidemic of 2013-16, the deadliest on record, took about eight months to reach the same milestone. Yet the World Health Organisation believes the true scale of the latest outbreak could be two to four times larger, because 80 per cent of new cases are outside established chains of transmission. Health officials say the epidemic is slipping beyond their control. Fewer than one in ten people who have been in contact with an infected person are monitored, making it far harder to isolate cases before they spread the virus further. Between Drajima reporting a death and the burial taking place, another three or four people can die. Families are prevented from carry- ing out traditional funeral rites under which they would nor- mally wash, dress and spend time with the body. Some house-
GRADEL MUYISA MUMBERE/REUTERS
Healthcare
workers demand
unpaid wages in
Bunia, Ituri.
Ituri
Drajima, the
chief of a village
in the province,
province
says that
terrified familes
to stay in
quarantine has
become
increasingly hard
Djugu
district
THE CONGO
Lake
Albert Bunia
30 miles
delays have fuelled suspicion and hostility towards the response teams, which travel with armed escorts. Lalu is on the front line of one of the DRC’s longest-running conflicts, the tribal war between the Lendu and Hema communities, whose militias have committed atrocities against each other for decades. Parallel conflicts in the mineral-rich region have put some communities beyond the reach of health workers. Drajima traces his village’s outbreak to the funerals of two people who had returned from the goldmining belt to visit relatives in Lalu, on the western shore of Lake Albert. Thousands of
lated camps, trading centres and vil- lages, making it difficult for health offi- cials to trace contacts once the virus begins spreading. Ebola is thought to spread from fruit bats to humans. In the region’s artisanal mines, bats roost in the tunnels where miners work, and the crowded camps where they live provide ideal conditions for the virus to spread. The outbreak is the 17th epidemic recorded in the DRC, but only the third caused by the Bundibugyo strain, for which there is no approved vaccine or treatment. On Friday, Oxford Univers- ity said that the first volunteer had been given an experimental vaccine devel- oped against the strain. Limited testing capacity for Bundibugyo delayed con- firmation of the outbreak, allowing it to spread unnoticed for weeks before it was identified in May. The first victim has yet to be identified. Ituri province, where Lalu is located, accounts for almost 90 per cent of con- firmed Ebola cases, and scores of health workers have themselves been infected. On Saturday doctors, nurses and secur- ity staff at the Elikya Ebola Treatment Centre in the provincial capital Bunia went on strike over unpaid wages, dis- rupting care in the centre of the out- break. For Drajima, the crisis has become a relentless cycle of deaths, forced quar- antines and scarce support. One of the chief’s toughest tasks has been per- suading villagers that Ebola was a virus rather than poison or witchcraft. Even now, some accuse the response teams of bringing the disease with them. “Yesterday I lost my nephew’s wife. The day before, I lost his daughter,” Drajima said. “Some families have already lost three people. Sometimes people ask me when the burial team will arrive but I have no answer to give them.”
Fears of flash floods as
Typhoon Noul arrives
heavy to torrential rain across much of southern China for the next two days, authorities said, after sweeping through Guangdong province and neighbouring Hong Kong with gale-force winds yesterday. China issued its highest-level alert for flash floods in several provinces after more than 700,000 people in Guangdong were forced to leave their homes, the authorities said. The Ministry of Water Resources and the China Meteorological Administration jointly issued a red warning for flash floods, which are expected in parts of Jiangxi, Hunan, Guangdong, Sichuan, Shaanxi, Gansu and southeastern Xinjiang. The public was warned to “pay attention to real-time monitoring, flood warning, and evacuation and risk avoidance prevention” after Noul, the year’s 12th tropical cyclone and China’s third typhoon this month, made landfall in Huidong county at about 8.50pm UK time on Saturday, provincial officials said. Noul is expected to bring strong winds and heavy rain as it moves inland, the Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said, with rainfall likely to persist until tomorrow. Some areas, including Fujian province, could have extremely heavy downpours. The authorities urged local governments to monitor flood- prone areas, including valleys, bridges and building sites.
President Milei of Argentina has
endorsed the Brazilian candidate
Boost for Bolsonaro Jr
Argentina has endorsed the right-wing candidate Flavio Bolsonaro’s bid for the Brazilian presidency, warning that the country faces a “Lula risk”. The eldest son of Jair Bolsonaro, the former president currently under house arrest, launched his challenge to President Lula da Silva at the weekend.
Three drones shot down
been summoned after three drones were shot down in as many days. President Dan said that one was a “Shahed model, used by the Russian Federation in its war of aggression against Ukraine”. Romania has reported dozens of drone incursions since Russia’s full invasion of Ukraine, with which it shares a border.
Sloppy speech shame
speech has gone viral after he accidentally read out an AI chatbot prompt while addressing his province’s legislature. Bill Oliver, a Progressive Conservative in News Brunswick, said: “Here’s a more natural, flowing version of that section that reads like a legislative speech rather than a series of short points.”
Italy
Alessio Perrone Milan
Italy has made a public apology after a group of teenagers visiting Bangkok insulted a Thai woman on a train who had asked them to be quiet. A video posted on TikTok shows the female passenger on the BTS SkyTrain accusing the pupils of being too loud, saying: “In Thailand we don’t scream,” and asking what country they were from. The students mock her, answer- ing “Thailand” and calling her a bitch. One teenager raises a middle finger,
The importance of being Ernest The annual Hemingway lookalike competition threw up a suprise in Key West, Florida this year. More than 130 hopefuls entered
the contest at Sloppy Joe’s Bar, which was won by Chris Dutton, from Tampa, above, who became the youngest winner in the competition’s 45-year history
beaches to honour Nazi soldiers
France
Adam Sage Paris
The D-Day landing beaches have become the first Second World War battlefields to be granted world heri- tage status in a move that commemo- rates the Allied and German soldiers who lost their lives in Normandy. Known by their Allied code names — Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword — the five beaches, along with the Pointe du Hoc promontory, were rec- ognised by Unesco’s World Heritage Committee at its meeting in Busan, South Korea, on Sunday. The move will help preserve the 50- mile stretch of Normandy coast from development and potential eyesores, like wind farms, officials saidy. As part of the application, France had to pledge tighter planning rules in the area and in a buffer zone around it. Officials have also promised to improve information and signs for the millions of tourists who visit the sites every year. Whereas Unesco long rejected bat-
while the others laugh and continue to make noise. In the video, posted on on the social media platform on Thursday, a teacher can be heard saying, in a sarcastic tone: “Sorry for bringing money to your country,”. The teacher tells the com- muter to “Shut the f*** up,” adding: “They are just children.” Thousands of social media users, many of them Thai, left angry com- ments on the Facebook page of the Italian Embassy in Bangkok after the video went viral. The original post was removed from
US reinforcements come ashore on
Omaha beach on D-Day, June 6 1944
tlegrounds as symbols of division, Normandy council argued that the beaches on which 156,000 Allied troops landed on June 6, 1944 had become symbols of “peace and reconciliation”. “The landing beaches are much more than historical sites: they are universal places of remembrance, bearing a mes- sage of freedom, peace, and unity among nations,” Hervé Morin, the head of Normandy council, said. In a sign of his determination to drive
A teacher and the pupils recorded a
video of apology after the incident
home the inclusive philosophy around the D-Day world heritage listing, Morin added that his thoughts were with the “435,000 soldiers killed or wounded in the Battle of Normandy”, which includes about 200,000 Germans. Morin said he would bring together officials from the 121 district councils around the sites in September to ensure all the panels highlighting D-Day land- ing beaches and memorials were of the same appearance and easily identifiable. The campaign in Normandy to grant the beaches world heritage status began in 2008, but it took six years for Paris to make even a tentative approach to Unesco over the issue. A 500 page application — which also featured 18,000 pages of appendices — was sub- mitted in 2018, but initially got nowhere owing to Unesco’s objection to listing modern battle sites. The barrier was lifted in 2023 when the UN body agreed to give world heri- tage status to 139 First World War me- morials and burial sites in France and Belgium, including British cemeteries. An updated version of the D-Day
TikTok but amassed more than 16 mil- lion views on X. Others identified the teenagers and targeted their schools’ social media accounts. Some videos show Thai people waiting outside the Italians’ hotel, demanding an apology. One Thai user wrote: “Bringing money, no one complains, but please bring some manners too”. Another wrote: “Bringing money to Thailand doesn’t make you a god.” The commuter lodged a complaint with police about the incident. She later posted a video on TikTok of the youths
ANDY NEWMAN/SLOPPY JOE’S BAR/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
application was put in last year. Its approval means that the beaches have become first Second World War battle- fields to be given world heritage status, although other sites associated with the conflict are already listed such as the Hiroshima Peace Memorial and Auschwitz-Birkenau. Normandy council said that 1.4 mil- lion people visited the Normandy American Cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach, 650,000 the Pointe du Hoc visitor centre and 546,500 the Germany military cemetery in La Cambe last year. Other sites include the Mémorial de Caen, visited by 440,000 people and the Airborne Museum in Sainte-Mère-Église, dedi- cated to the US paratroopers who parachuted into Normandy, which at- tracted 260,400. France has 54 sites on Unesco’s heri- tage list and the UK 35. Among the other sites given world heritage status was Mount Olympus, the highest mountain in Greece, and home to the gods of antiquity, accord- ing to Greek mythology.
apologising “to you, to your family, and to all Thai people”. “The Embassy of Italy in Bangkok expresses its deep regret and strongly condemns the inappropriate behav- iour, a representative said on Sunday. “The inappropriate behaviour of the group of under-age tourists does not in any way represent the Italian people.” The embassy added that the pupils would be returned to Italy. “We’ll also try to teach our group again to strictly respect [Thai] culture. Thank you for welcoming us and we kindly ask for your forgiveness.”
violence not ‘real crime’, says senator
Australia
Lisa Creffield Sydney
A female Australian politician has claimed that domestic violence is a “two-way street” and that “women can also lose their cool”. Pauline Hanson, the leader of the right-wing One Nation party, told a podcast that domestic violence was taking police away from “real crime” and that there were “too many woke people in parliament now, and it’s push- ing women’s rights”. The 72-year-old senator denied her remarks were “vile” and “dangerous” and said they had been taken out of context. One in four Australian women have experienced intimate partner violence since the age of 15. On average, one woman is killed every week by a cur- rent or former partner. Approximately 27 women have been killed in 2026, ac- cording to Counting Dead Women Australia, a register that tracks and ver- ifies the homicides of women. Blair Williams, who studies gender and Australian politics at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, said: “The whole point of this and her politics is to appeal to angry white men. Hanson has made remarks about anti-male bias and she’s very anti-feminist.” Marian Sawer, from the Australian National University in Canberra, said there was “quite a history of open miso- gyny in Australian politics”, adding: “A recent example is the ‘Ditch the Witch’ billboard in Melbourne, attacking the Victoria state premier, Jacinta Allan.” Sarah Hanson-Young, a Green party senator, was told to “stop shagging men” during a parliamentary debate on violence against women in 2018, while Troy Buswell, the former deputy leader of the Western Australian Liberal Party, sniffed the chair of a female Liberal staffer in 2005 and made sexual noises. Julia Gillard came in for particular vitriol as Australia’s first female prime minister from 2010 to 2013. Opposition MPs were criticised for making mon- key-like noises while she spoke, while the Liberal senator Bill Heffernan ac- cused her of being “deliberately barren”. In 2012 she delivered a speech about misogyny, in which she declared: “I will not be lectured about sexism and miso- gyny by [Tony Abbott, the opposition leader] ... If he wants to know what misogyny looks like in modern Austra- lia, he doesn’t need a motion in [parlia- ment], he needs a mirror.” Williams said Gillard’s speech failed to change attitudes then but there had since been an improvement. “Women politicians have become less afraid to speak out on gender issues,” she said.
E
From our correspondent
richard lloyd parry nagasaki
Apart from his many other distinc- tions, Thomas Glover must be the only Scottish arms dealer to have been turned into a Japanese cuddly toy. I bought him in the gift shop next to his old house in Nagasaki, a 19th- century hillside bungalow-turned- museum, overlooking the city’s famous harbour. He has been rendered as a bow- tied, moustachioed plushie with a close resemblance to Waldorf, the grumpy old codger from The Muppet Show. In Japan, only the very cute or the very important achieve soft toy status. Glover’s apotheosis is a mark of respect for a man, all but forgotten at home, who played his part in the transformation of Japan from feudal isolation to the pre-eminent power in early 20th-century Asia. Over half a century, he helped to
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lay the foundations of Japanese coalmining, ship-building and beer- drinking, quite apart from his activities as a gunrunner. “Among those who profoundly influenced Japan’s modernisation”, the exhibi- tion in Nagasaki notes with solemn restraint, “his name cannot be over- looked”. Glover was born the son of a coast- guard in 1838 in Aberdeenshire, became a shipping clerk, and went to work in Shanghai for the trading company Jardine Matheson. At the age of 21, he set himself up as a dealer in green tea and fetched up in Nagasaki, which had long been the most cosmopoli- tan city in Japan. In the 16th century, the sho- gun, the general- issimo who ruled Japan as overlord of the samurai, had thrown out the for- eign missionaries and traders who had settled there, and fearfully sealed the country off from invasive foreign influence. After about 250 years of feudal isola- Hope for a degree? Prepare for a war
China
Richard Spencer China Correspondent
Maybe all parents worry when their children go abroad for the first time. In China, where they are bom- barded with stories of violent US cities and the dangers of immigration agents, they go to extreme lengths. The latest trend is hazardous envi- ronment training courses, similar to those taken by civilians sent to work in war zones in the Middle East. For a fee, students about to enroll in American universities can spend time at a boot camp where their introduc- tion to life in the West can include mock kidnappings and robberies. In one exercise, recorded by the Hong Kong newspaper the South China Morning Post, students are preparing for bed when a masked
tion, deprived of access to modern military technology, the shogunate found itself enfeebled as western powers arrived with steam- driven iron warships to force the country open to trade, and impose a series of unequal treaties. The houses built by Glover and other British merchants, preserved today in a park called the Glover Garden, could be imperial relics of India or Sri Lanka. They are a reminder that, although Japan was never a colony, it was only a step away from the kind of foreign dom- ination that contributed to the end of the Qing dynasty in imperial China. It was saved by a group of rebellious samurai from the Jap- anese province of Cho- shu, who successfully overthrew the shogunal government, known as the bakufu, on the pretext of “restoring” to power the young
man breaks into their bedroom, ties them up, and forces them to record a message on their phone asking their parents to pay a ransom. “I hope I never have to use any of this, but I definitely feel more alert after learning it,” one student, named Lulu Lu, told the newspaper. The US, followed by the UK and Australia, remains the favoured destination for Chinese students. Although Chinese universities are improving fast, western degrees still carry prestige, as well as bringing the opportunity to practise English. Some students are also attracted by the greater freedom and academic openness. At least 260,000 Chinese were at American universities in the last academic year, though that is down from more than 300,000. However, Chinese education and
ALAMY
Thomas Glover’s home
overlooks the port of
Nagasaki and is now a
museum. So influential
was the Scotsman that a
soft toy in his image has
been produced
Emperor Meiji, and speedily mod- ernised the country. They did so with the repeated help of the young Scottish tea merchant. In 1863, he sneaked out a group of young samurai, the “Choshu Five”, who travelled to London to study at University College, and returned to become senior figures in the new government — Japan’s future first prime minister, Hirobumi Ito, made the journey disguised as a deckhand. Two years later, Glover took the risk, for a good price, of smuggling 7,300 French and German rifles to the Meiji revolutionaries. In the next few years, and despite one embarrassing bankruptcy, he con- tributed to the indus- tries most impor- tant to a weak country bent on becoming strong: coal and ships. He devel- oped coal- mines on near- by islands, com- missioned warships for the new navy, estab- lished the country’s first dry dock, and import- ed a Scottish crane for the Nagasaki shipyard, which is still in use. The mines and shipbuilding busi- ness became the mighty Mitsubishi conglomerate. The brewery Glover created would later become known as Kirin, now Japan’s second biggest beer company — according to myth, the moustaches on the mythical animal that is the company’s symbol were inspired by Glover’s abundant Scottish whiskers. His biographers are divided over whether he acted out of idealistic or mercenary motives, or a mixture of both — but in practice it made no dif- ference. “He sold arms not only to Choshu, but to allcomers, it appeared, even to the bakufu,” Sidney DeVere Brown, the historian, wrote. “Naga- saki was only a small city of 40,000 population, but a mere 250 to 300 for- eigners who resided there changed Japan forever.”
propaganda has for decades stressed the dangers of American cities, com- pared with their more restrictive but generally more law-abiding equiva- lents in China. Stories of academics being deported or arrested have only made matters worse since President Trump cracked down both on China’s engagement with American scientific institutions and on immigration. The Chinese authorities already offer training for those going abroad for government-funded courses. This year, they added a warning of the hos- tility those going to the US were likely to face from immigration officers. In Britain, the number of students from China has held up better than expected, in part because parents nervous of America have sent their children to the UK instead.
the times | Monday July 27 2026 29 Business
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Transport Correspondent security. He said the new runway could help to solve the “ticking bomb” of the number of 16 to 24-year-olds not in employment, education or training — known as “Neets” — which has now exceeded one million, or one in eight young people in Britain. Burnham wants to put welfare reform and cutting the benefits bill at the heart of his premiership and has held talks with Alan Milburn, a former Labour cabinet minister conducting a review in- to youth unemployment and inactivity.
Laurence Sleator
A third runway at Heathrow could help Andy Burnham to deliver the jobs needed to cut the country’s benefits bill and drive economic growth, the airport’s boss has said. Thomas Woldbye, the airport’s chief executive, urged the prime minister to back his runway plan, highlighting the “full span” of jobs a new runway would create, from engineers to those in
get tough on tech giants’
Emma Powell Media and Telecoms Editor
The former chairman of the UK’s com- petition regulator who was ousted by Rachel Reeves has led calls for Andy Burnham’s government to toughen oversight of the world’s largest techno- logy companies. The Competition and Markets Authority was given new powers at the start of last year to move more swiftly on this front under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act, but critics say that the watchdog has been too soft in its execution. “The outgoing regime’s approach has only ended up making it harder for the UK’s world-leading tech innovators to disrupt dominant incumbents and reduce the country’s tech dependency,” Marcus Bokkerink said. Bokkerink was ousted by the former chancellor in January last year as part of Labour’s contentious push for regu- lators to make economic growth their priority, and was replaced by Doug Gurr, a former Amazon UK executive. The CMA’s teams were “the best in the world”, he said, but could “only open up markets where they’re allowed to”. He alleged that the Starmer-Reeves government “took over” the CMA board and revised its strategic direction to slow enforcement of the new powers. The designation of Amazon and Microsoft’s cloud businesses as having “strategic market status” was “can- celled” and “conduct requirements for Google and Apple in mobile avoided”. Businesses with strategic market status can have conduct requirements im-
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posed upon them which are intended to improve competition for UK business- es and choice for consumers. Amazon and Microsoft instead agreed to volun- tary commitments to lower exit fees and improve interoperability between different systems. Last month Google was ordered to give publishers greater control over how their content is used. However, while these “basic requirements” gave publishers some control over their con- tent, they stopped short on implement- ing rules to ensure they receive “fair and reasonable” terms, including on payment, Bokkerink said. A spokesman for the CMA said that it disagreed with the criticism and that making a “swift impact” in digital markets was “a key priority”, adding that its “track record of action to open up competition in search and mobile is clear”. Bokkerink said: “The new Burnham government appears to have a much better understanding than its predeces- sor that the best way to help consumers and entrepreneurial businesses achieve broad-based growth is fair competition in a level playing field — and that tech infrastructure and services are no ex- ception. Making this explicit in a new steer to a revitalised CMA will help free up a new dynamism for the economy.” The Department for Business, Inno- vation, Science and Trade said: “The CMA’s recent transformation under Doug Gurr and Sarah Cardell’s leader- ship has been impressive and it has improved its pace, predictability, proportionality and processes.”
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Woldbye told The Times: “A growth agenda is absolutely necessary; it’s what brings us out of the challenge we have with education. We have one million Neets in this country, which I think is a ticking bomb. We need to disarm that. This [the third runway] is one of the ways you can do that. “You have people working in security who get some education from us; people working in baggage handling are not high-skilled jobs. Then in the development phase you have archi-
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tects, engineers,” he said. “The jobs we create are really across the full span.” Burnham has previously expressed scepticism about the plans. He told Times Radio in January last year that the runway could divert “infrastructure investment away from the north and trap it in London and the southeast” and said it worked against “a more bal- anced, levelled-up economy”. A Department for Transport report has suggested the economic benefits of the £49 billion project could be limited.
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Woldbye said he had contacted Burnham’s team over the proposal. His plan has won the support of Lord Blun- kett, chairman of the Heathrow local growth taskforce and the man Burn- ham described as his “mentor” in his first speech as Labour leader. Blunkett said: “We risk failing a generation if action isn’t taken to secure opportunities for the one million young people who currently have no clear horizon to aim for. While we wait for
funds unite to drive UK innovation
James Hurley Assistant Business Editor
A consortium of some of the UK’s larg- est pension providers has agreed to ex- plore the creation of a new fund to back the most promising British private companies. The proposals for a so-called UK Scale-up Fund are backed by several pension managers including Railpen, which manages £34 billion in assets and oversees railways pension schemes, Nest, the government’s workplace pen- sion scheme, and Border to Coast, one of the largest pension pools in the UK, re- sponsible for about £120 billion of assets. The new fund is expected to manage more than £1 billion, and the govern- ment said it would be of “sufficient scale to target the best opportunities born out of UK innovation in science and technology”. “By bringing together major pension investors, the UK Scale-up Fund would help connect institutional capital with the companies, founders and venture managers driving the next wave of Brit- ish innovation,” the government said. Andy Burnham said the scheme would “help unlock good growth in every postcode, connecting pension in- vestment with the entrepreneurs and technologies that will reindustrialise Britain and create the jobs of the future”. The British Business Bank, the state economic development agency, is working with the pension providers. Talks on the fund are understood to be at an early stage and no details are yet available on the fund’s mandate or structure. The talks come in the context of concerns that progress has been too slow on getting pension funds to back British companies. The Sunday Times reported that the Business Growth Fund, Britain’s most active equity investor in private compa- nies, had delayed a £500 million fund- raise because of purported reticence from British pension funds.
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The former chairman of the UK’s competition regulator who was ousted by Rachel Reeves has led calls for Andy Burnham’s government to toughen oversight of the world’s largest technology companies. 2
A third runway at Heathrow airport could help the prime minister to deliver the jobs needed to cut the country’s benefits bill and drive economic growth, the airport’s boss has said. 3
A consortium of some of the UK’s largest pension providers has agreed to explore the creation of a new fund to back the most promising British private companies. 4
The UK is facing a “sustained period of weak growth” as the renewed conflict in the Middle East puts pressure on the new chancellor before the autumn budget. Projections from the EY Item Club, a forecaster, said GDP growth was on course to slow to 0.9 per cent this year from 1.3 per cent in 2025 and to weaken to 0.7 per cent next year. 5
Developers, hit by higher construction and financing costs, are building fewer new offices than at any point in the past two decades. 6
Doncaster Sheffield airport is pitching its credentials as a regional hub for military cargo and weapons before its proposed reopening, as it seeks to capitalise on the expected rise in defence spending. 7
Acorn Mobility Services, a stairlift company based at a business park near Bradford, in West Yorkshire, has paid its Monaco-based founder a £50 million dividend, bringing total payouts to more than £350 million for the past 12 years. 8
The head of the Fair Work Agency, which was brought into being in April by Labour’s Employment Rights Act, is looking to crack down on the exploitation of employees. The Resolution Foundation, a think tank, estimates that 900,000 workers a year have some holiday pay withheld.
pricing in almost two full interest rate rises by the end of the year
Simon French,
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heatwaves and weight- loss drugs are eating into the chain’s success, Jessica Newman writes
For most of the British public, the recent heatwave has been an invitation to visit beer gardens, attend barbecues and scramble to the ice cream aisle of the local shop. For the boardroom at Greggs, how- ever, it has been a cue to start worrying. And not without good reason. This time last year the FTSE 250 bak- ery chain was forced to issue a profit warning after unusually high tempera- tures put customers off buying its baked goodies, including its famous sausage rolls, of which it sold more than 300 million last year. Britain has seen no shortage of ex- treme heat this year, either, and hotter summers are expected to be the new normal, so the Greggs board will prob- ably have to steel itself for the challenge of sustaining footfall as consumers turn their backs on hot pastries. City analysts expect the weather to have thrown up a headwind for Greggs, which is set to reveal its half-year re- sults on Wednesday. While the company, which tempora- rily closed nearly a dozen of its stores during June’s heatwave, may have pre- viously anticipated a strong summer, the trading picture “has clearly soften- ed”, analysts at Jefferies said. Patrick Higgins, an analyst at Good- body, echoed their concerns, saying that while the comparatives for the seven weeks to June 27 were soft, he wasn’t expecting the group’s perform- ance to have improved because of per- sistent unfavourable weather and muted consumer demand. Investec, Greggs’s house broker, ex- pects Wednesday’s figures to show a sharp increase in pre-tax profits to just over £75 million, helped by annualised cost savings, the opening of new stores and higher pricing. The company has already told share- holders that profits in the second half of the year are expected to be lower as a result of higher fixed costs related to its new distribution centre in Derby, which is expected to be fully operational by the end of the year.
Top backer opposes Pinewood sale
One of Pinewood Technologies’ largest shareholders is refusing to support its proposed £545 million sale to an Amer- ican private equity house because of an “unprecedented” clause in its takeover offer. Harwood Capital, which owns 5.7 per cent of Pinewood, has taken umbrage with the preferential liquidation rights set out by Ridgeview Partners. On Friday evening, Ridgeview tabled a 448p-per-share bid for Pinewood, which was known as Pendragon before it sold off its nationwide chain of motor dealers in 2024. The company now focuses on selling proprietary dealership management software to car retailers. Under the proposal, Pinewood share- holders would have the option of selling their shares for cash or rolling them over into the new company. In the offer documents, Ridgeview has said that, in the event of any future sale or liquida- tion, it would be made whole first, while any Pinewood shareholders who rolled
Despite the anticipated profit drop in the second half, Greggs has so far guid- ed the market that full-year profits will come in at similar levels to last year’s £167.4 million. The consensus among analysts is for the company to deliver sales of £2.29 billion this year, up from £2.15 billion in 2025. While unpredictable weather may get part of the blame for short-term vol- atility in consumer behaviour, the deeper pressure facing Greggs stems from structural anxieties about the company’s growth trajectory. Notwithstanding market volatility, the Geordie empire has true scale — more than 2,750 shops as of May — and a cheap and cheerful formula that con- tinues to resonate with British consum- ers. And it has more than sausage rolls to rely on — it sold more than 70 mil- lion pizza slices in 2025. However, Greggs has suffered a re- versal of fortunes in the past couple of years. Its shares, which at their peak in 2021 hit £34.16, are now changing hands for £15.82. The shares suffered their worst annual performance on
Sausage rolls sold last year
record in 2025, falling 37 per cent. Greggs, dogged by slower sales since the middle of 2024, has been candid about navigating a tough trading envi- ronment, which it put down to a weak consumer backdrop. Higher prices, forced by inflationary wage and raw material costs, have tested the loyalty of even its most devoted customers, with many stretched households seemingly trimming their spending habits. As sales growth has decelerated, the market’s scepticism around the com- pany’s aggressive store expansion plans has heightened, with investors ques- tioning whether its push to over 3,000 stores is a sustainable pursuit of growth or a march toward diminishing returns and cannibalisation. The bakery chain, Britain’s biggest, has come a long way since John Gregg was delivering eggs and yeast to fami- lies on Tyneside before opening his first shop in Gosforth, Newcastle, in 1951. Love it or hate it, Greggs is one of Britain’s most recognisable brands; a success story that has garnered it
over their stakes would have to wait their turn. “I’ve never seen this in all my life,” Christopher Mills, Harwood’s founder, said. “Let’s say it all goes wrong and Pinewood is later sold for £300 million, our clients would be junior to [Ridge- view] and could lose all their money, while Ridgeview wouldn’t lose a penny. “That would be an absolutely new precedent in the London stock market. Although we feel that the chances of us not getting our money back are ex- tremely low ... it opens the doors [for other acquirers to do the same]. The con- cept of preferential liquidation rights would create a damaging new precedent for investors in British equities.” Harwood plans to vote against the deal, although Mills, 73, is hopeful that the Pinewood board will push for the terms to be amended. “If they made it fair, we would vote [in favour of the sale] and roll our shares over,” he said. “If we can’t roll over on fair terms, we want this company to remain independent.” Pinewood’s board has indicated that
Greggs became one of Britain’s best known brands after Roger Whiteside, right,
national treasure status. After listing on the London Stock Exchange in 1984, then with a market value of £15 million and a portfolio of just over 260 shops, it steadily plodded along until Roger Whiteside came in as chief executive in 2013. It was Whiteside who trans- formed Greggs from a traditional “take-home” bakery into an on-the-go ready-to-eat operation, also adding
if Ridgeview made a formal offer at 448p per share, it would be “minded to recommend” that shareholders accept it. A number of major shareholders, who own almost half of the shares, have said they would accept the offer. Among those backing the deal is Lithia, America’s largest car dealership group that bought the old Pendragon business two years ago and which owns 32 per cent of Pinewood. A spokesman for Pinewood said: “Harwood Capital is entitled to make its own judgment on the potential trans- action. The board of Pinewood believes the proposal from Ridgeview ... is com- pelling, providing the business with the support of a well-capitalised and strate- gically aligned partner, while offering shareholders the opportunity to realise their investment in cash at a material premium to the current share price. “The share alternative allows share- holders with the appropriate risk appetite to remain invested.” Ridgeview was approached for comment.
salads, sandwiches and wraps, and the vegan sausage roll to its product line. By the time he retired in May 2022, having overseen a sevenfold increase in the company’s share price, Greggs had more than 2,100 shops. Under Roisin Currie, who was pro- moted from retail and property direct- or to chief executive after Whiteside stepped down, Greggs has continued to
Third runway ‘key to jobs drive’
recommendations of the Milburn re- view, there are some levers we should be pulling with both hands. “Projects like Heathrow expansion promise tens of thousands of new op- portunities, all underpinned by private investment. That’s tens of thousands of lives and livelihoods that can be trans- formed by a single project, that is ready and waiting to go.” Heathrow wants to build a privately financed 3,500m runwayby 2035 as part of a £49 billion investment. An alternative shorter runway proposed by Surinder Arora, the hotel tycoon, is also under consideration, although the government has said that its preference is for Heathrow’s plan. Woldbye claimed that the “silent majority” across the country supported the additional runway for the airport. “That’s my experience,” he added. “They only get the positive, the economic growth, the innovation, the jobs. It’s the closer you get where it comes with nuisance and noise. The further away you get the more positive you are.”
became chief executive in 2013 and expanded its offering
supercharge its store numbers by open- ing more than 650 shops since her ap- pointment. Currie is adamant there is room to grow Greggs’s portfolio to over 3,000 shops in the longer term through ex- panding into towns it has yet to enter, as well as into transport and roadside locations such as “drive-thrus”. Once its distribution hubs in Derby
Emma Powell Media and Telecoms Editor ductivity, competitiveness and long- term growth. Ensuring businesses have the confidence, funding and support to move forward will be critical.” Andy Burnham is hoping for an increase in business investment, an area of weakness in the UK economy. Official statistics show that whole economy investment in the UK, which includes business and public sector investment data, was the lowest of the G7 leading economic nations in the first quarter of the year. A fall in energy prices and stable eco- nomic conditions were among factors that would prompt businesses to invest more, the Lloyds research suggests. The findings echo another survey by the bank at the end of June, which found business confidence had dipped over the month. The pressure of rising operating costs, weaker trading conditions and liquidity constraints were among the biggest deterrents to businesses in- creasing their spending. Lloyds said that companies were most worried
Almost half of British companies plan to raise investment in the next 12 months, despite concerns about the potential economic fallout from geopo- litical turmoil, research suggests. Only 7 per cent of businesses surveyed by Lloyds Banking Group said their appetite to invest in their opera- tions had decreased, with 47 per cent intending to raise spending. About three quarters said that invest- ment was “essential for future growth and resilience”, with confidence the highest among businesses in the East Midlands, Scotland, London and the northwest. Most spending was being directed towards technology and artifi- cial intelligence infrastructure. Amanda Murphy, chief executive of business and commercial banking at Lloyds, said that “while many business- es have already secured funding for investment, a significant proportion have yet to deploy it”. She added: “Investment drives pro-
and Kettering are up and running, Greggs will have the capa- city to cater for 3,500 shops. Capital expend- iture has risen sharply in the past few years, peaking at £287.5 mil- lion in 2025 as it invest- ed across its portfolio
and developed new logistics infrastruc- ture that will “support the next phase of growth”. Greggs expects to spend £200 mil- lion in 2026, with that number falling to between £150 million and £170 million in 2027, at which point management believes the group’s “strong operating cash generation creates material capa- city for cash returns”. One City analyst argued the main issue facing Greggs was that it is caught between a rock and a hard place. “If Greggs don’t continue with their open- ing plans then you could argue that they are not utilising new infrastruc- ture,” the analyst said. The company is targeting about 120 net openings in 2026. However, the an- alyst said they “wouldn’t cry if they scaled that back to 80 to 100 stores for a period of time, just while the consum- er remains under pressure”. Currie is also being forced to grapple with a newer phenomenon: weight-loss drugs. Concerns over the impact drugs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro will have on appetites for pasties and sweet treats are understandable. The chief ex- ecutive has admitted that appetite-sup- pressing drugs have led to people look- ing for smaller portions. In response, the company has started offering healthier products such as egg pots, overnight oats and protein shakes. Andrew Wade, an analyst at Jefferies, has warned that the increasing use of these drugs represents a “struc- tural issue” for the company and could starve Greggs of some of its best customers. “It may only be 10 per cent of GLP-1 users that would shop at Greggs,” Wade said. “But that 10 per cent would be high- BMI individuals consuming lots of calories and, we would infer, likely some of Greggs’s best customers. “The arrival of the first weight-loss tablet, which went on sale earlier this month, will no doubt continue to reshape how more people shop and eat.” Greggs’s ability to navigate a cooling con- sumer environment and an evolving health landscape will be the defining test for man- agement.
about the rising cost of production, like- ly to be tied to higher energy prices triggered by the Gulf conflict. Renewed attacks between the US and Iran have triggered a resurgence in the price of Brent crude, which is trad- ing at about $93 a barrel. The Lloyds index of sentiment among private sector companies dropped by 3 points to 44 per cent in June, below the 12–month average of 47 per cent. Economic optimism also dropped by 4 points to 31 per cent. Political instability has added to un- certainty for businesses, with Burnham becoming the fifth prime minister in four years. He has promised to be “a pro-business leader of the Labour Party, as I was a pro-business mayor of Greater Manchester”. Last week he cut business rates for pubs, clubs and live music venues in England by 20 per cent, which he de- scribed as “a first step” for struggling companies. However, bosses have called for the government to go further and reform the business rates system.
The banking sector’s half-year results will be closely watched by both analysts and the new guard in Westminster as the industry remains a possible target for increased taxation. Barclays, Lloyds and NatWest are set to report combined pre-tax profit of just over £14.1 billion for the first six months, up by 14.6 per cent from £12.3 billion for the same period of 2025. The figures come hot on the heels of bumper profits from the Wall Street giants. Such figures are unlikely to escape the watchful eyes of Treasury officials as they seek to drum up ways to fund prime minister Andy Burnham’s ever- growing list of giveaways. Executives facing questions on possible surcharges are likely to stress that the banking sector is already subject to far higher tax rates than other areas, and will be central to any bid for growth. Meanwhile, analysts will be looking out for any threat of an uplift in loan losses from an expected rise in energy costs
tomorrow
While GSK is issuing its half-year results, attention in the City will be firmly focused on the FTSE 100 pharma group’s strategy update later on Tuesday which is due to be led by Luke Miels, chief executive since January. The consensus revenue forecast among analysts is
wednesday thursday
London investors will be waking up to digest Rio Tinto’s half-year results, released late on Tuesday night by the Anglo-Australian miner. The FTSE 100 group is expected to report a 28 per cent rise in first-half earnings before interest, taxation and other charges, to $14.87 billion, according to Ben Davis of RBC Capital Markets. The company, which mines iron ore, copper, aluminium and lithium, has already released production figures for the first half, reporting a 3 per cent increase in copper equivalent production. Its smaller rival Glencore is also scheduled to release production figures on Wednesday. Finals: Altitude Group, Hargreaves Services Interims: Aston Martin Lagonda, Glencore, Greggs, Rio Tinto, St James’s Place Trading statement: Paragon Banking Group, PayPoint, Sage Economy: US interest rates decision
friday
International Consolidated Airlines Group is expected to shed further light on the extent to which the airline industry has struggled in the face of conflict in the Middle East when it delivers its half-year results. Investors will be hoping that there is no repeat of the nasty
Andy Burnham in Harlow, Essex, last
week. Treasury officials will be
eyeing banks’ profits with interest
stemming from the renewed heightening of the conflict around the Strait of Hormuz. The City will also pay close attention to any assessments on direction-of-travel for the housing market and the outlook for capital distributions through share buybacks and dividends.
£8.2 billion for the second quarter. But investors will be looking for Miels to reiterate GSK’s headline 2031 revenue target of £40 billion, and to outline how the company will overcome the loss of patent exclusivity to its important Dolutegravir franchise, used to treat HIV, from 2028 to help
get there. UBS analysts said: “At the Q2 results we expect an update on the pipeline and broader portfolio.” Finals: Games Workshop Interim results: Bodycote, Croda International, Man Group, Unite Trading update: Barclays, GSK, Unilever
The war in Iran has been more of a blessing than the curse Rolls-Royce investors initially feared, having given another nudge to governments to increase defence spending. Rolls makes engines for fighter jets and warships but its single largest business line is the Trent XWB engine for the long-haul Airbus A350 aircraft, below. After wobbling in March, the Rolls-Royce share price set a new record this month. It would be a surprise if the company did not repeat its forecast of growing its annual underlying operating profit to between £4 billion and £4.2 billion in 2026, and generating free cashflow of £3.6 billion to £3.8 billion. Interims: Anglo American, BAE, Haleon, Lloyds Banking Group, London Stock Exchange Group, Rolls-Royce Trading update: Foxtons, Pets At Home, Shell Economy: Bank of England interest rates decision
IAG will deliver revenues of €29.7 billion and a pre-tax profit of €3.5 billion, according to Factset. Interims: IG Group, IMI, IAG, ITV, Melrose Industries, NatWest, Pearson, Rightmove, Taylor Wimpey Economy: Nationwide House Price Index
surprises they got in the British Airways owner’s first-quarter results, when it told shareholders that annual profits would be lower than originally anticipated as a result of a €2 billion hit from higher oil prices. The consensus among analysts is that
Renewed Gulf war to ‘slow UK economy for two years’
Mehreen Khan Economics Editor
The UK is facing a “sustained period of weak growth” with the economy at risk of slowing for two consecutive years as the renewed conflict in the Middle East puts pressure on the new chancellor before the autumn budget, according to a leading forecaster. Projections from the EY Item Club, a forecaster that uses the same models as the Treasury, warned that GDP growth was on course to slow at a rate of 0.9 per cent this year, down from 1.3 per cent in 2025, and weaken further to 0.7 per cent next year after the recent rise in oil prices. It would be the weakest run of economic growth since the end of the pandemic lockdowns in 2023. Global oil prices have hit $100 a bar- rel for the first time since May after the breakdown of a ceasefire between the United States and Iran and the expan- sion of the conflict to the Red Sea, where Yemen’s Houthi rebels have struck tankers from Saudi Arabia. Matt Swannell, chief economic ad- viser to the Item Club, said the UK was facing a “sustained period of weak growth”, with little reprieve from global factors pushing up energy costs. “The growth outlook over the next year or so is likely to be challenging. Higher energy prices are adding to the pressure on households and businesses at a time when demand is already sub- dued,” Swannell said. “The economy is going to move forward, but at a slower pace than we have seen over the last couple of years.” The weak growth outlook is a blow for Andy Burnham, who has promised to restart the economy by lowering the cost of living and rebalancing the economy away from London and the southeast. The combination of rising oil prices, higher government bor- rowing costs and a lower growth profile is likely to have wiped billions off the headroom that John Healey, the new chancellor, has to meet under Labour’s fiscal rules at his maiden budget this autumn. Rachel Reeves left a £23 billion buffer against the rules at her last bud- get, which may have been reduced by more than half, according to inde- pendent estimates. The Re- solution Foundation has said
Concerns about issues including data security, copyright and liability are holding back the adoption of artificial intelligence at small companies. The Federation of Small Businesses said in a report that companies needed “clear answers” to “basic questions” before they would fully embrace AI in an effort to boost their productivity. The study by the country’s largest employers’ group found, however, that many companies are already reporting seeing some benefits from the rise of “large language models” such as Open- AI and Anthropic, with three in five saying they have seen some productivi- ty gains and one in four saying it had helped to boost their revenues. AI adoption among smaller busi- nesses had almost tripled since 2023, the FSB said. However, it added that more than nine in ten still had concerns about issues including data security, copyright and liability. About one in three said better gui- dance on implementing the technology would encourage them to adopt it. The report comes shortly after Andy Burnham gave Kanishka Narayan, the AI minister, a seat at the cabinet table. There are growing questions over whether the enormous investment being made by the AI industry will be justified by better productivity. The Office for National Statistics said that adoption to date had been relatively shallow among UK businesses with ten or more employees, with the average number of AI technologies used per adopting business rising only modestly, from about 1.4 to about 1.6 since 2023. Tina McKenzie, policy chair at the FSB, said: “The technology is moving at pace, but too many are asking basic questions about data, copyright and lia- bility, and they deserve clear answers. “The new AI minister has a real op- portunity to make the UK the best place in the world for small firms to adopt AI, but that will only happen if he puts trust at the heart of the govern- ment’s approach. “That means giving them clear an- swers on who owns AI-generated con- tent, how their data will be used, and who is responsible when things go wrong. He also should ensure small firms are not left to navigate this rapidly changing technology on their own. “They must have access to practical guidance and support to help them adopt AI safely and confidently.” London office market defies construction slump as rents soar
Tom Howard Property Correspondent felt in regional towns and cities. In 2021, about half of all office space under construction was in London but that has increased to 73 per cent, which CoStar said was “one of the highest ratios on record” and the most in at least 20 years. Patrick Scanlon, senior director of analytics at CoStar, said the recent drop-off in activity reflected “a combi- nation of persistent economic uncer- tainty, the high cost of debt and inflated construction and labour costs”. The data underlines the viability challenges facing developers of all types. Housebuilders have also scaled back their ambitions over the past year or so, with their margins being crimped by markedly higher costs and stagnant
UK developers, hamstrung by higher construction and financing costs, are building fewer new offices than at any point in the past two decades. In the 12 months to the end of June, work began on just under 4.5 million sq ft of office blocks around the country, equivalent to nine Gherkin buildings. It is the lowest annualised total that CoStar, the real estate analytics provid- er, has recorded since the end of 2004 and half as much as was being built in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. At the peak of the office construction market in 2007, work started on close to 24 million sq ft of new office blocks in the UK. The worst of the slowdown is being
The return to fighting has sent the oil price soaring, eating into the fiscal headroom left by Rachel Reeves
the headroom is at £7 bil- lion, while Swannell said it was likely to have fallen by a quarter to just over £17 billion. The extent of erosion could force Hea- ley into raising taxes or announcing spending cuts at his first budget. “The current fiscal framework leaves little
room for a significant increase in spending,” Swannell said. The government has announced a rise in defence spending of £4 billion by the end of the decade, with £1 billion of that not yet funded. The Item Club said inflation was on course to peak this year at 3.5 per cent, having fallen to 2.6 per cent in June, as the rise in oil prices raised Ofgem’s energy price cap in the second half of
house prices. The downturn has been seen in industry data, with S&P Global’s UK construction purchasing manag- ers’ index lingering at six-year lows and well below a level that would signal year-on-year growth. For office developers, booming rents for brand new, state-of-the-art blocks has at least improved the economics of some of their planned schemes in the capital. Businesses increasingly want to base themselves in that “prime” space but a shortage of it has caused a rapid appre- ciation in rents in London. Knight Frank estimates that prime rents in the City have risen by 46 per cent since 2020, while rental growth in the West End has totalled 68 per cent over the past six years.
the year. The unemployment rate would hit 5.5 per cent from the current 5 per cent — with 200,000 more people out of work, the forecaster said. Rising energy prices and a weak la- bour market would mean interest rates remained at the current 3.75 per cent for the rest of the year, Swannell said. The Bank of England makes its next decision this Thursday and is expected to make no change to the base rate.
copyright fears hold up AI adoption
James Hurley
commanding rents in excess of £100 per sq ft per year, strengthening the invest- ment case for developers. However, rents in other cities are much lower, while build and financing costs are broadly similar. In Manches- ter, the best offices rented out for about £45 per sq ft last summer, according to Savills. The viability challenges in the regions will be of concern to Andy Burnham who has made a point of driving “growth in every corner of the country”. Scanlon said that the political uncer- tainty in the UK and questions about where Burnham wanted to take the country had “added to [developers’] nervousness about pushing the button on new projects”.
E
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much-needed stability — for now
Financial markets don’t expect the Bank of England to raise interest rates this week. Economists agree. The combination of recent encouraging inflation data, a lack of clarity on the new chancellor’s tax and spending intentions and volatile events in the Gulf mean there is no urgency to act. At least not for now. However, with the global oil price hovering around $100 a barrel, natural gas prices up 50 per cent in the past month and container rates moving steadily higher, this may be a temporary reprieve. Investors are now pricing in almost two full interest rate increases from the Bank by the end of the year as it grapples with the prospect that the 2.7 per cent inflation rate seen in June is as good as it gets. For a Labour Party that trumpeted six interest rate cuts since it took office as one of its signature achievements — which has always been a suspect claim given the cuts had very little to do with government policy — the new top economic team of John Healey and Andy Burnham may shortly have to change their tune. The first thing to note is that mortgage, loan and savings rates offered to households and businesses are already reflecting the rapid change in the economic backdrop. Retail banks are not waiting for the Bank to move. Mortgage rates have risen to their highest in a month as the inflationary risks have re-emerged. The cost for the UK government to borrow for ten years has also climbed to 5.1 per cent — hovering around levels last seen before the global financial crisis. The world’s largest debtor — the US government — is now paying an interest rate of 4.7 per cent a year for its ten-year borrowing. For investors starved of yield for investment, these are, nominally at least, an embarrassment of riches. They can demand such returns not just because they see high inflation
John Healey, the chancellor,
may have to change his tune
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coming, but also because they are seeing strong profits growth in the corporate sector. So governments have to compete for capital. Back to the Bank and, perhaps paradoxically, this response in financial markets makes its job of controlling inflation somewhat easier. Higher interest rates for governments and households restrict their incentive to borrow more and chase prices higher. In central bank parlance these “tighter financial conditions” restrict the growth of money and keep a lid on price growth. Indeed, one of the features of recent months has been the modest growth in the money supply at 4.5 per cent a year. Preceding the price shock of the Ukraine war, UK money supply had been growing at close to twice that pace — helping to fuel the inflation that followed. This is one of several reasons that the Bank has not followed its peers at the European Central Bank, Bank of Japan, and the Reserve Bank of Australia in raising interest rates this year. One major central bank that has also followed this path is the US Federal Reserve. Under the new chairmanship of Kevin Warsh, US monetary policymakers have dispensed with “forward guidance”, under which they would provide strong, conditional signals to financial markets on what interest rate policy to expect next. The cynic might suggest this has less to do with an intellectual evaluation of forward guidance as a policy tool but more the unpredictability of the current occupant of the White House. So, if we are in a new era of working it out for ourselves, what should we be looking for that could shift the Bank from wait-and- see to feeling it must act? I believe there are four things to look out for. First are inflation expectations. The uncomfortable reality for the Bank is that inflation has averaged 3 per cent since 2010. The UK price level is now 20 per cent higher than it would have been had a 2 per cent inflation rate been achieved every year since that target was introduced in 2004. There is a significant risk —
indeed increasing evidence — that businesses and households are coming to expect a high level of inflation. This means the credibility of price stability gets lost. Upcoming surveys of how Britons are reacting to inflation arising from the conflict in the Gulf will be key for policymakers at the Bank. Second is the role of international events. It is inevitable that events in the Gulf will frame both this week’s Monetary Policy Report from the Bank, and its policy stance. Interest rate expectations have closely followed oil and gas price volatility. If conflict-related disruption to shipping persists into the autumn fuel prices are likely to remain elevated. Third is the impact of upcoming pay settlements. Private sector pay growth is running at a six-year low of 2.9 per cent and with unemployment and vacancies data showing a soft labour market there is relatively little evidence that workers will be able to negotiate inflation-busting pay deals. That said, there is uncertainty about whether this will hold, particularly in the public sector, given that the government has revealed its hand by responding to industrial action and pushing public sector pay inflation up to 5.5 per cent a year. Fourth and finally is the autumn budget. There remains a high level of uncertainty on how significant a change of fiscal policy the new cabinet will attempt. There is an obvious contradiction that the new Labour leadership talk about the biggest economic change in 40 years but everyone in markets knows they are hemmed in by their fiscal rules, the parliamentary Labour Party and their commitments in the 2024 manifesto. Resolving that contradiction will have implications for inflation given the role of public policy in explicitly setting prices across many sectors. Together, these data give the Bank a bit more time before changing policy — in either direction. That policy stability, at least for now, is good news for a UK economy that has had too much volatility to contend with in recent years.
Simon French is managing director, head of research and chief economist at Panmure Liberum
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clone work, human skill is our new gold
very wave of automation comes with a familiar death knell for human skills. Weavers heard it when mechanical looms arrived. Bank clerks got it from the rise of spreadsheets. Now it’s craftsmen, writers and financial advisers who are supposedly under threat from the large-language model revolution spearheaded by the likes of Open AI and Anthropic. The sombre ringing tends to be premature. Not because technology doesn’t deliver, but because value has an odd tendency to focus on whatever the machine still can’t quite get its hands on. Artificial intelligence can bash out a thousand plausible sentences before breakfast. But one thing it can’t do is sense that it is absolutely not the moment to say the true thing out loud. It may know the facts; it doesn’t yet know the occasion. This is not a processing problem to be solved with additional parameters. You can’t put it in a training set, which is precisely why human intelligence holds its value. We’ve seen this film before. In the 1970s, with inflation running hot and faith in paper money shaky, people turned to gold. Not because it had suddenly become more useful overnight, but because it had a long history of holding its value. Its price rises and falls from quarter to quarter, but over five- and ten-year periods the trend has been consistently upwards. Today, gold is close to twice what it was two years ago, despite a dip so far this year. This is even truer of gems. A flawless one-carat diamond went from about $7,000 in 1975 to near $60,000 by 1980. What gold and gems have in common is scarcity no government could conjure away. Downing Street can always find ways to increase the supply of money. It cannot produce a decent sapphire and it certainly can’t produce the generations of cutting skill that turn a rough stone into something worth having. AI is doing to many outputs of human thinking what the printing press did to money in the Seventies: turning what used to be scarce into something that can be obtained for next to nothing. Decent prose, passable design, adequate analysis, all churned out at what is currently
a low cost. But just as debased currency didn’t make gold worthless, this shouldn’t make human skill worthless either. If anything, the opposite is true. When AI floods the market with “good enough”, that’s your cue to look for what’s still scarce: instinct, taste, excellence, judgment, trust, a steady hand. Buying an engagement ring was never simply a transaction. Nobody’s paying for the carbon lattice. The value is the embodiment of emotion in rare beauty, because a jeweller understood what was needed without being told, because the whole object is carrying weight a spreadsheet has no way of carrying. The same goes for a hand-thrown bowl, a small vineyard’s wine, a tailor who remembers how you stand. These were always, at bottom, about one human passing meaning to another. AI isn’t competing with that. If anything, it’s making human interaction more valuable. Here’s the bit that keeps me up at night: this kind of skill isn’t sitting in a vault, waiting patiently for demand to return. A master craftsman’s judgment was never written down, mostly because it can’t be. It lives in the hands, in years of apprenticeship, in being corrected on the small details by someone who’d been doing it for 40 years. Unused, it doesn’t just wait quietly, it rots. Shut a workshop for a generation and it doesn’t reopen with the knowledge intact. It starts again from absolute zero. De Beers could warehouse diamonds indefinitely and wait for the market to turn. Nobody can warehouse a dying trade. What needs protecting is simple to state, but harder to act on. A nation’s real wealth in a few decades won’t just be measured in models trained or how many AI chips were bought. It’ll be measured by whether it bothered to keep its workshops and apprenticeships alive long enough for any of this to still matter. Not out of sentiment, but because scarcity is what sets the price. We have learnt this more than once already. This time, we should remember the lessons from previous technological breakthroughs before we are taught the same lesson again.
Charlie Pragnell is chairman of Pragnell, a sixth-generation jeweller
D
airport set for renewed war footing
oncaster Sheffield airport is pitching its credentials as a regional hub for military cargo and weapons before its proposed reopening, as it seeks to capitalise on the expected rise in defence spending (Guy Taylor writes). The airport is based at the former RAF Finningley airfield in South Yorkshire and has a long military history, including acting as a base for the Royal Flying Corps to repel German Zeppelins during the First World War. It also has one of the longest and widest single runways in the UK, which was designed for long-range nuclear-armed bombers such as the Avro Vulcan during the Cold War. Doncaster Sheffield closed in 2022 after its private operator, Peel Group, deemed the airport not financially viable. Efforts to relaunch have been supported by the City of Doncaster council and Oliver Coppard, the South Yorkshire mayor, with cargo flights now slated to return next year and passenger flights from 2028. “For any airport with the size of our runway, we’ve had and continue to have conversations with the Ministry of Defence,” Christian Foster, the programme director
Frasers pushing to install Murray as Hugo Boss chief
Isabella Fish Retail Editor A stairlift company in West Yorkshire has paid its Monaco-based founder a £50 million dividend, bringing total payouts to more than £350 million for the past 12 years. Acorn Mobility Services, based at a business park near Bradford, was founded by John Jakes in the early 1990s and its sales have been lifted by growing demand from an ageing popu- lation and overseas expansion. Pre-tax profits rose to £63.3 million from £57.8 million on revenues of £288.9 million, compared with £267.5 million in 2024, recently filed accounts at Companies House show. The sales included £44.1 million of services. Declared dividends rose to £50.4 mil- lion for the year to September from £44.8 million a year earlier. Jakes, 70, a British national who is resident in Monaco, is a director and –retains 100 per cent ownership of Acorn, according to the accounts. His fortune was estimated at £926 million in this year’s Sunday Times Rich List, up £57 million and ranking him 170th. Jakes keeps a low profile. He has been described by a businessman familiar with him as a “very elusive guy”. He founded the company in 1992, starting out by repairing used stairlifts
Frasers Group is exploring ways to install Michael Murray as chief execu- tive of Hugo Boss as it attempts to seize greater control over the German fash- ion house. The retail group, which is owned by Mike Ashley, has spent the past few years building a significant stake in Hugo Boss in an effort to exert influ- ence over the brand, which it stocks in its Flannels and Frasers shops. Last week Frasers pushed its stake in the fashion label above 30 per cent, clearing the threshold that triggers a mandatory takeover offer under German rules. Sources told The Times that Frasers was laying the groundwork to try to position Murray as chief executive of Hugo Boss. Murray, Ashley’s son-in-law, is the chief executive of Frasers and has been attempting to take the group more up- market by moving into luxury retail. Pushing for Murray to become chief executive would follow the signature Frasers playbook, a strategy deployed in late 2024 when the company attempted to install Ashley as chief executive of the online retailer Boohoo. Frasers had quietly built up a major-
Christian Foster said discussions over the future of the airport, which was a base during the First World War, had intensified
overseeing the project, said. Discussions have intensified in the past year as geopolitical volatility pushes governments to prioritise military spending. These include how the airport could be used to
Michael Murray is chief executive of
Frasers and Mike Ashley’s son-in-law
ity shareholding, making it Boohoo’s largest single investor. Once it held enough weight, it used that position to demand boardroom changes. The Sports Direct owner launched a takeover offer last month. The group said it believed that increasing its stake would “create value for Frasers’ share- holders”. However, Hugo Boss urged share- holders to reject the £1.7 billion bid, which it claimed undervalued the brand. The fashion house said Frasers’ offer of €38.00 per share in cash for the 74 per cent it does not already own was “inadequate from a financial point of
transport weapons and key infrastructure such as tanks and military vehicles and even personnel. “The other piece about the military is thinking about Nato and US air defence and how airports
view”. Frasers said a takeover of the brand would “create value for Frasers’ shareholders”. Founded in 1924, Hugo Boss has glob- al sales topping €4.2 billion. It is under- going a turnaround as it struggles with brand confusion, a global decline in demand for formalwear and a wider slowdown in the clothing market. The company originally produced general-purpose clothing but began to focus on men’s suits after the end of the war. It went public in 1988. Since 2021 it has been led by Daniel Grieder, a former boss of Tommy Hilfiger. Frasers’ latest intervention comes after Murray’s official appointment to the Hugo Boss supervisory board in May last year. If Frasers acquired the business it would be its biggest deal yet. The retail group owns brands includ- ing House of Fraser, Evans Cycles and Jack Wills. Last year Frasers warned that it would vote against any future dividend pay- ments from Hugo Boss. The retail group said it believed the Hugo Boss share price was “undervalued” and that the company, which is listed on the Xetra stock exchange in Frankfurt, should prioritise increasing its market valua- tion over returning cash to shareholders. Frasers declined to comment.
support other military nations,” he said, referring to the use of RAF bases on Cyprus during the Iran war. “You’ve also got Nato jets, American jets, flying into our airports already.” The case for more
military capacity among regional hubs is likely to be bolstered by the temporary closure of RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire for “essential” resurfacing and improvement works.
£50m dividend as profits rise
fired up for new reactors
Emma Powell
A Manchester-based company that was spun-out of BAE Systems has raised an initial £15 million to develop the first nuclear reactor that uses gas turbine technology, promising to make nuclear power faster to deploy and cheaper to produce. The fundraising, led by IQ Capital, a venture capital firm, is the first from Nuclear Turbines since it was carved out of the FTSE 100 defence giant last October and will help to finance de- tailed design work on the technology. The design replaces steam turbine systems with high-temperature turbine technology that is normally found in jet engines and gas-fired power plants, which it has said can be used to power critical infrastructure such as industrial facilities and data centres and manu- facturing facilities. Jeremy Owston, co-founder of Nu- clear Turbines, said: “The industry has always designed reactors first, then figured out what to do with the heat. We flipped this script: we started with the cheapest way to generate power and designed a reactor to fit.” Owston, a former principal engineer at BAE, and his co-founder Professor Tim Abram, claim that the technology can generate electricity at one-fifth the cost of traditional steam-powered nuclear plants because of a much smaller footprint which significantly reduces the cost of construction. The government aims to increase the amount of nuclear power on the grid, selecting Rolls-Royce to build the country’s first small modular reactors. The reactors, the first of which is set to come on line by 2034, are seen as a cost-effective and faster way of boost- ing the supply of nuclear power, which can provide a baseload as intermittent renewables come on to the system.
before turning to making them two years later when used ones became difficult to source. His son James, 38, is a racing driver, and Acorn sponsored him when he raced in the IndyCar Series in the United States. Acorn makes, sells, installs and services stairlifts, and says its products help the elderly and those with restrict- ed mobility to remain in their homes for longer. It has factories in Yorkshire and Scotland and exports to more than 80 countries, according to its website. Total employee numbers increased to 1,529 last year from 1,400. Acorn said 2025 was a “successful year”, with sales aided by “optional product configurations increasing the average selling prices. It added: “Gross profit margın is 73.7 per cent compared with 74.6 per cent in the prior year, which, while fairly static, is impacted by increased costs in both material pricing and labour.” It increased its stock by about £3 mil- lion in order to deliver items before an increase in tariff rates. A third of its sales were generated in the UK, 14 per cent from elsewhere in Europe and the remainder from the rest of the world. The company has subsidi- aries in the United States, Canada, Aus- tralia and South Africa, as well as in Europe’s biggest economies. Acorn was approached for comment.
UK workers owed billions I
T entrepreneurs network compliance
Work Agency tells Richard Tyler about her mission to crack down on employee exploitation
n the complicated world of work, the government’s new labour market pay and rights enforcer tries to keep things simple. Lisa Pinney, chief executive of the Fair Work Agency, says it has two questions that it asks itself every day. The first: “How do we get money that’s owed back to individuals?” And
the second: “How do we make sure we take legal action to prevent it from happening again?” This, in a nutshell, is what the agency has been doing since it was brought into being this April by Labour’s Employment Rights Act. Last week some of its 650-strong team visited a fruit farm in Scotland, alongside other government agencies, after reports of poor working and living conditions that included mouse and rat infestations in caravans housing workers, inconsistencies relating to pay and hours worked, and excessive working hours. Some of the employees affected were foreign citizens working under the UK’s seasonal worker visa scheme. The farm owner has already made improvements since the visit. Businesses that spot problems with underpayment of salaries, sick pay or holiday pay, can avoid enforcement action if they come clean and make good the arrears. Employers who are caught are likely to be fined — and can be named and shamed. The Resolution Foundation, a think tank, estimates that 900,000 workers a year have some holiday pay withheld, with the total owed worth about £2.1 billion. The Low Pay Commission estimates that about 371,000 people were underpaid the national minimum wage in 2024. The agency also investigates worker exploitation, including modern slavery, and has the power to issue civil penalties, negotiate legally binding undertakings, apply for directors to be banned, and to recommend that employers are prosecuted. It often works alongside the police, and with the appropriate prosecution body, such as the Crown Prosecution Service in England and Wales. Pinney hails “greater awareness” about workers’ rights, and the creation of the agency for driving a steep increase in inquiries. Its labour abuse arm responded to 2,741 inquiries in the first quarter of this year, up 87 per cent on the year before. National minimum wage concerns were up 19 per cent to 2,933 in the same period. Pinney joined as chief executive in April, having previously been the boss at the Mining Remediation Authority, which oversees mining safety and its environmental impact. Before that she was an executive at the Environment Agency. Her sales pitch to employers is carrot and stick. “We want workers to know what their rights are and how to get support. We want businesses to feel that compliance is simpler and easier to achieve and that they’re treated fairly,” she says. “And we want to underpin that by being able to demonstrate really strong action against those who set out to exploit workers or to undercut legitimate business.” The agency is collaborating with Acas, the advisory and dispute resolution body, to create “a much clearer” digital shopfront for businesses to help them navigate the challenges of employing people. Industry groups have expressed concerns about how some
Lisa Pinney heads Labour’s Fair Work
of the new employment rights will work in practice and will be enforced. The Recruitment and Employment Confederation supports the agency’s creation, and is encouraged by its pledge to help employers and the promises of firm action. But it is also looking for risk-based enforcement. “It can be easy to find areas where there are unintentional errors or minor infringements, but it is really important to find those rogue operators who may not be so plainly in sight,” says Lorraine Laryea, the confederation’s chief standards officer. Pinney says the agency will be transparent about its enforcement approach when the government decides the date from which it will have responsibility for policing holiday and sick pay. “There won’t be any situation where we’re going to say ‘this power is switched on tomorrow — we’ll be on your doorstep’,” she says. While the agency will take covert action against employers where it has intelligence of serious breaches of the law, working with the likes of the National Crime Agency, its preferred approach is to give employers a heads-up that it is coming.
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Agency. Lorraine Laryea, below, of the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, which is supportive of the agency
“We would much rather support and enable businesses to do their reviews, to do the right thing, to make any changes,” Pinney says. “We recognise most businesses want to do the right thing. We also recognise that people make mistakes.” The agency has replaced the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate and the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority, which had a combined annual budget of £47 million. The new agency has a budget of £60 million and will work alongside the National Minimum Wage compliance team. Its powers also include fining employers who do not pay awards given to a worker in an employment tribunal or in an Acas settlement. It can also bring employment tribunal claims on behalf of individuals and offer legal assistance in civil cases. Pinney is busy behind the scenes knitting together the different teams and systems that now form her agency, as well as talking to partners that can help the organisation fulfil its function. These include the Care Quality Commission, which regulates social care providers — one of the agency’s two hot sectors for activity, the other being construction. Britain’s cash-in- hand “grey economy”, which includes activity such as hand car washes and nail bars, is also under scrutiny. Pinney has already begun
There are moments when titles become irrelevant and you simply roll your sleeves up discussions with Companies House, HMRC and the Insolvency Service to find ways to combat rogue directors who place their companies into administration, walking away from unpaid wages, tax and other bills, and then starting up the same business again — a phenomenon known as phoenixing. Those calling the Fair Work Agency include “whistleblower” employers that tip off the agency about poor practices at other companies. “We encourage businesses and others to tell us if they think that there are things in their sector where people aren’t behaving in the right way,” Pinney says. In terms of naming and shaming companies that break the law, the agency will continue to do so for those failing to pay the minimum wage or who do not pay employment tribunal awards. Last October nearly 500 employers were fined more than £10 million for failing to pay the minimum wage, with £6 million received by 42,000 employees. The companies included Centrica, home to British Gas; Cineworld and Holland & Barrett. Pinney says she was open to the idea of extending its use to other areas, such as holiday and sick pay. “It does drive change,” she says. To raise concerns with the Fair Work Agency, email: contact@fairworkagency.gov.uk
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In the trenches: the reality of a life in business
Adam Sopher
f you’re having a rough month in business, you’ll probably know the feeling of opening LinkedIn and wondering what you’re doing wrong. Everyone is winning. Revenue is up. New contracts are being signed. Teams are thriving. Awards are being collected. Apparently every business in Britain is having its best year ever. For full disclosure, I’ve been one of those people. Like most founders and chief executives, I’ve historically posted Joe & Seph’s wins. The exciting new customer. The latest gourmet popcorn flavour launch. The great team achievement. What I’ve rarely posted about is the gourmet popcorn melting in the warehouse. That’s the purpose of this column. “In the trenches” is a place for the reality of running a business. Not the polished version. Not the conference stage version. The version where you’re trying to look calm and in control, like a swan, while paddling furiously beneath the surface. Don’t get me wrong. Our team has achieved some incredible things this year and I’m hugely proud of what we’ve built and the business turnaround we’re completing here. But every founder knows there are moments when the chief executive title becomes irrelevant and you simply roll your sleeves up and deal with whatever crisis has landed in your inbox. Last week was a perfect example. Monday began with our continuing rent review negotiations. Our Joe & Seph’s Popcorn HQ (where we manufacture our products) is in a leased 27,000 sq ft site in Park Royal, west London. Historically the area was known for food production and manufacturing. Today it is increasingly becoming home to vast data centres and housing developments. The result? Commercial rents have effectively doubled over the past five years. I actually worked out that being the landlord of our building in that time would have been more lucrative than setting up and starting our business. The rent they’ve earned from us and the valuation growth of the property has been phenomenal. In response to this rent hike, like many businesses, we’ve had to revisit our plans. Recruitment has been delayed and investment in new products slowed and we’re instead having to prioritise sales growth. By Tuesday I was attending the excellent Times Entrepreneurs Live event, enjoying a rare day away from operational issues. Then my phone buzzed: the warehouse air
conditioning couldn’t cope with the heatwave and our popcorn’s handmade caramel coating was beginning to melt. There are very few business problems covered in management textbooks that involve emergency popcorn preservation, but our operation’s Microsoft Teams chat quickly exploded with suggestions of expensive last-minute air- conditioning providers. Wednesday brought another reminder that global events have a habit of finding their way on to your profit and loss account. Several sea freight containers carrying our products to the Middle East were disrupted by regional conflict and ended up taking an unexpected detour, docking in Sri Lanka and India until another vessel was able to take them to the Gulf. It proved fairly costly. Thursday was when I made the mistake of opening LinkedIn. Post after post celebrated record growth, exciting opportunities and endless success stories. After a few minutes of scrolling, I deleted the app. Then Friday arrived with a reminder from our packaging compliance provider that our latest reporting deadline was approaching. For those fortunate enough not to know, this involves submitting detailed information on the volume of every single piece of packaging sold (as part of our products) over the previous six months, categorised by material type, recyclability, weight and a host of other requirements. I really do have a member of our team sat in the office weighing the paper sleeve that goes round our gourmet popcorn and the amount of tape used to seal a box. Naturally, this arrives just as our supply chain team is implementing a new stock control system. Perfect timing. None of these challenges are unique, however. Every business owner will have their own version of the same story. Different industry, different products, different problems, but the same feeling. An unexpected cost increase. A supplier issue. A regulatory deadline. A customer problem. Something breaking at precisely the wrong moment — that’s life in the trenches. So if you’re having one of those weeks where nothing seems to go according to plan, you’re not alone. Behind every “everything is amazing” post is usually a founder quietly dealing with a problem nobody else can see. I’m here to start doing so a little less quietly. And if you’ve got a good war story from your own business, send it in. We might feature some of the best in future editions. After all, misery loves company — particularly when the company has melting popcorn.
Monday July 27 2026 | the times Business
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Base Rates Clearing Banks: 3.75%
ECB Refi 2.40%
Fed Fund 3.5-3.75%
Halifax Mortgage Rate (SVR) 7.24%
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the times | Monday July 27 2026 41 Register
David Austin
In 1967, when he was nine years old, David Austin had an experience that potentially paved the way for an exact- ing attitude towards business in later life. He was at the time a day boy at Birchfield Preparatory School near Wolverhampton, with his name on the list to be a pupil at Shrewsbury, the alma mater of his father, also David Austin, a farmer who had been dabbling in rose- breeding. Austin Sr had just gone bankrupt, however, which meant that private education for his children had to be curtailed. Austin, his elder sister and younger brother were all sent to the Abraham Darby Comprehensive School in Telford. The young Austin took the change in circumstances in his stride, changing the name he was then known by — Julian — to David, to sound less middle-class, and thriving academically and in sports. He went on to complete a degree in business studies at the new University of Salford. His father would finally enjoy finan- cial success in the 1980s, having found- ed David Austin Roses, breeding new varieties which he marketed as “En- glish roses”. These were intended to in- tegrate the character, scent and volup- tuous beauty of “old-fashioned” shrub roses, with the disease-resistance and repeat-flowering qualities of the modern hybrid tea rose, which had been the only mainstream choice avail- able to gardeners for decades. Colour was another important con- sideration, with classic shrub roses gen- erally exhibiting softer pinks, yellows and off-whites, as opposed to the rich and sometimes gaudy hues associated with the floribunda and hybrid tea ro- ses of the 1950s and 1960s. “Charm and grace” were the nebulous watchwords when it came to selecting new roses, a mantra adhered to by Austin and by the third generation to run the company, his sons Richard and James, and his daughter Olivia. The naming of roses was another im- portant factor; the passion of Austin Sr for English literature led to a series of flowers named after characters from the works of Thomas Hardy and Lord Tennyson, such as “Eustacia Vye” and “Lady of Shalott”. The firm’s attitude to this matter has changed over the years — its most recent rose, launched at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show, was “Sir David Beckham”. David Julian Charles Austin was born in 1958. His father was a poet and the author of a number of books on ro- ses while his mother, Pat, was a sculptor who would carve stone in a large tent in the garden. Theirs was a bohemian set- up, with Austin and his two siblings left to run almost free at the farm-nursery in Albrighton, Shropshire, riding on tractors, making dens from hay bales and enjoying a large menagerie of animals. They were each given a vege- table patch at about the age of five and as a teenager, Austin would earn extra pocket money weeding the fields. He would not become an expert rose breeder himself, but instead, later on, brought his business nous and market- ing expertise to the firm, notably in the realm of cut-flower production. His sis- ter, Claire, worked at David Austin Ro- ses through the 1980s and 1990s before setting up her own successful nursery
Austin’s roses included one named for the King, presented to its namesake at the RHS Chelsea Flower show last year
business, while his brother, James, a professor of computer science at the University of York, helped to create the company’s first retail website, consid- ered pioneering at the time. Their mother designed the company logo. After university, in 1979, Austin joined the family firm, but not for long. At this time, the office was a cramped Portakabin set in the middle of the nur- sery. Austin was living in a cottage on site, avidly reading the Financial Times each day and planning to qualify as an accountant to aid his dream of being an entrepreneur. The company was still struggling to make an impression, and Austin admitted later that he found the experience boring and unchallenging. His girlfriend (later his wife), Franci-
ne, whom he met in 1980, had a family background in the jewellery business, and the following year they opened what was to become a chain of jewel- lers. The first shop was in the newly opened Telford Shopping Centre, breaking the traditional mould by do- ing away with a locked front door with a door bell for customers. During the mid-1980s five more branches of David Austin Jewellers opened across the West Midlands. Business pressures including the ex- pansion of Gerald Ratner’s cut-price chain led to the end of the venture in 1993, with Austin returning to the family firm in 1990. By this stage the nursery business had developed con- siderably. Austin’s main contribution to
ANDREW MAYBURY; OLIVER DIXON/SHUTTERSTOCK
the business was his realisation that cut flowers were an untapped market, at least when it came to the kinds of flowers his firm was breeding. Flowers for florists’ bouquets and buttonholes tend to be tightly furled, lacking scent and character since they are bred primarily for resilience and transporta- bility. Austin envisaged a premium range of roses sold as cut flowers that had many of the characteristics of the garden plants his company sold, but which could withstand long-distance transportation, while also boasting a significant “vase-life”. Austin Sr was initially unconvinced by his son’s plans for its expansion, which led to some fiery disagreements — though generally the relationship was good, their bond forged by a shared obsession with Wolverhampton Wan- derers. Austin was a season-ticket hold- er and named one rose variety “Molin- eux”, after the club’s home ground. The cut-flower business went on to become a profitable division of David Austin Roses, with some six million stems sold annually. Another impor- tant area of business instigated by Aus- tin, the sale of potted roses wholesale to garden centres, was facilitated by the construction of large cold-store build- ings and the rental of fields from neigh- bouring farmers. The first priority for Austin when he rejoined the firm, however, was inter- national sales. He travelled the world to broker licensing agreements with nur- series — enforcement of the patents re- mains an important if discreet aspect of the firm’s activities. David Austin Roses are sold in more than 40 countries, with
offices in the US and Japan and a turn- over of just under £30 million in 2024. Austin also expanded the firm’s mar- keting department and made sure that the photography of roses in catalogues, online and in advertising was of a high standard, which was not (and is not) generally the case in the nursery trade. Above all, Austin embraced the mar- keting concept that his father had pio- neered, which was that their “English roses” were unique and special, and should therefore be able to justify a higher price than those of most of their competitors. Production costs are simi- lar, however, which leads to higher profits. It never seemed to matter that the only authority to endorse the term “English rose” was the company itself. Austin was always careful not to make claims about perfection, which was his stated aim, but was instead can- did about the shortcomings of some of his plants. When his cousin, the garden designer Bunny Guinness, suggested to him that some David Austin Roses might “go on for ever”, his quiet re- sponse was, “Some do, some don’t.” And after more than a decade of pleading from the designer Jo Thomp- son that the company bring back its classic “Munstead Wood” rose, he final- ly explained that while it is a beautiful flower, the plant itself was not reliable enough. Austin said he believed his duty was to deliver consistency to his customers. (He did relent, to a degree, in that the variety is currently available again in small numbers, though with a stern disclaimer regarding its suscepti- bility to disease.)
the watchwords for selecting new flowers
Austin worked alongside his father until his death in 2018, when he took over as chairman, although he had already effectively been running the company for several decades. He lived a few miles from Albrighton, making a home — and garden — with his second wife, Penny, after the end of his mar- riage in 2007. He had a keen sense of economy with regard to the company’s profits. On one occasion, while packing up at a German flower show, Austin surprised col- leagues when he climbed into a large wheelie bin to tread down its contents to avoid the expense of hiring another one. He was a keen golfer, and main- tained a small collection of classic cars with an emphasis on Porsches. He vol- unteered to work at specialist garages to increase his knowledge of mechan- ics, and when asked what gift he would like to receive from his employees for his 60th birthday, he requested a pro- fessional-standard toolkit. Genial, softly spoken and prepared to speak to anyone, Austin nevertheless possessed a certain killer instinct when it came to matters of business. Accord- ing to his family, when they played Monopoly, he always won.
42 Monday July 27 2026 | the times Register Sir Edwin Jowitt
A racially motivated killing must be one of the gravest kinds of killing, Sir Edwin Jowitt told the defendants before him. He added: “You put your heads to- gether with the purpose of arming yourselves and of attacking an inno- cent man you might find by chance sim- ply because he was of a different race to yourselves.” Jowitt, sitting as a High Court judge, was presiding over a trial involving the gang murder of Ross Parker, a white teenager killed in 2001 by a group of men of Pakistani origin in Peterbor- ough. The attack on Parker, while out walking with his girlfriend, came amid tensions after the September 11 attacks in New York and Jowitt imposed hefty sentences: he condemned the brutal nature of the crime, describing it as “cowardly and senseless” and driven by racial hatred, rejecting arguments that the murder was not racially motivated. He jailed the ringleaders for life with minimum terms of 15 to 18 years. His firm handling of the trial in 2002 drew praise for its clear focus on evi- dence. He was two years into his retire- ment but still occasionally sitting on the High Court bench and the sensitivity of the case made Jowitt, previously a cir- cuit judge and recorder of Birmingham, an obvious choice. Sir John Goldring, a retired Court of Appeal judge who knew Jowitt in chambers, said: “He was meticulous, precise, a very, very good criminal judge.” It was not the only time his judicial skills were sought after. In 2004 Jowitt was one of three judges chosen to lead inquiries into three controversial kill- ings in Northern Ireland. In his case it
Comedy actress and muse of Woody Allen who channelled America’s mid-Seventies neurosis in Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman
Louise Lasser was a young woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown when she met Woody Allen. Then the life of the young actress and singer un- folded like one of the director’s deli- cious Manhattan romantic comedies — strolls through Central Park amid a fusillade of quips and film references, pilgrimages into dingy and bohemian record stores where he bought her Lady Day by Billie Holiday, or meeting on the lip of the fountain outside the Plaza Hotel in homage to F Scott Fitzgerald. Allen himself recalled being smitten at first sight and in the giddiness of their early dates imagining himself “striking brooding poses like Montgomery Clift”. “The Ls in her name were formed by the tongue, which was immediately sexual. The Ss didn’t hurt either,” Allen wrote in his autobiography Apropos of Nothing. “She was a blonde, beautiful creature with saucer eyes. She was charming, smart as a whip, quick, very funny, and witty ... She had a chesty voice and carnal promise oozed out of every pore. She was also a little nuts because God has a variety of dirty tricks up the heavenly sleeve of his white robe.” In essence Lasser was the perfect muse for Allen’s zany brand of comedy in films such as Take the Money and Run in 1970 and Bananas in 1971, matching his angsty verbosity with an other- worldly eccentricity. In real life, Allen was dating Diane Keaton by this point and his four year marriage to Lasser was over. The couple would remain friends. In 1972 Lasser appeared in Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask) as a woman who could only achieve or- gasm in public places. Lasser later said that the most impor- tant lesson Allen taught her was just to
was the investigation into the murder of Robert Hamill, a 19-year-old Catholic kicked to death by loyalists in Porta- down, Co Armagh, in April 1997. He chaired a panel that held extensive public hearings, listening to testimony from more than 130 witnesses. He faced some criticism and legal challenges from former Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officers for his de- cision to refuse them anonymity and force them to testify without their faces being screened. His decision was up- held by the House of Lords. Jowitt’s final report, completed in February 2011, spanned five volumes and cost £33 million. The inquiry was said to have found no evidence of delib- erate collusion between RUC officers and the loyalist perpetrators of the attack but highlighted multiple system- ic failures that allowed the killing to oc- cur unchecked and undermined prose- cutions of suspects. Legal proceedings delayed publication of the final report, which is now scheduled for after this
‘physically ill’ from nerves going into court
year’s summer parliamentary recess. Edwin Frank Jowitt was born one of three boys in Ripley, Derbyshire, in 1929. His father, Frank, was an engineer and his mother, Winifred (née Hunt), was a businesswoman. He went to Swanwick Hall Grammar School, then read law at the London School of Eco- nomics, gaining an LLB. When he was
Lasser with Woody Allen, to whom she was married for four years from 1966
to 1970. Above right, as the title character in Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman
be herself. “He said, ‘I do jokes, your comedy is attitude’.” For 18 months from January 1976, Lasser did just that. Portraying the title character in the soap opera satire Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, Lasser was the embodiment of America’s neurosis for five nights a week, syndicated all over the country. She played a neurotic housewife in Ohio who watches an advert and won- ders why the product she bought has not removed the waxy yellow stains on the linoleum floor. Through surreal twists there are police sirens outside the house because a murderer is on the loose, her grandfather has been ar- rested for exposing himself and a next-
Jowitt was regarded as a meticulous
and independent-minded judge
14 one of his mother’s friends said that he had a tongue like a barrister; that, his mother thought, was the start of his legal ambitions. He was called to the Bar (Middle Temple) in 1951. In 1959 he married Anne Barbara Dyson, a nurse. She died in 2008. They lived in Desborough, Northampton- shire, where they brought up their five children, two of whom went into law: Rachel, a therapeutic counsellor; Simon, an artist and teacher; Emma, a nurse; Matthew, attorney-general for Jersey; and Justin, a City solicitor. A lifelong and devout Roman Catho- lic, Jowitt also had a sense of humour
door neighbour has drowned in a bowl of soup she brought him. “I thought she was like a survivor that lived in a world that might not be worth surviving in, you know,” Lasser said in her languid voice. The show was a satire on the fantasy of consumer society amid the grim real- ities of a country still reeling from the Vietnam War and Watergate. Lasser added extra authenticity because of her perennial mental health struggles, and channelled more madness by dressing for the part in a bizarre doll-like ging- ham dress with puffed sleeves topped off by a red wig and her trademark pig- tails. Irony wasn’t a strength of US
and would entertain the family with a party piece. It involved one of them holding his hand with the door almost closed so he could not be seen. He would be wearing a waistcoat and jacket and would contrive to reappear, with the waistcoat over the jacket. Mountain walking was a great passion, as was cy- cling: when less stable later in life, he took to a tricycle. At the Bar he shone as a cross-exam- iner, joining chambers at 2 Crown Office Row (colleagues included Geof- frey Lane and Igor Judge, both later to become lord chief justice). Hacking re- calls: “He was a superb advocate and a careful but brilliant cross-examiner. It was surprising later to learn that he had to conquer his nerves before going into court. He described being physically ill.” Jowitt developed a successful crimi- nal practice mainly on the Midland cir- cuit, taking silk in 1969, becoming a crown court recorder in 1972, a circuit judge in 1980 until 1987 then the senior circuit judge and recorder of Birming- ham from 1987 to 1988. As a judge he was regarded as firm and fair, tending towards old-school strictness rather than what became the modern, more friendly approach. He did not suffer fools and expected coun- sel to be fully prepared. His widely re- spected ability as a senior circuit judge led to promotion to the High Court bench in 1988, where he stayed until 2000. The move was a surprise to him, if not others; he would modestly say he never thought it would happen. In 1991 he presided over the trial of Frank Beck, accused of systematic child abuse at Leicestershire children’s
GETTY IMAGES; SHUTTERSTOCK
comedy in the Seventies and many thought the Norman Lear series ahead of its time. “When she read a bit of the script for me, I all but cried for joy,” Lear recalled. “Louise brought with her the per- sona that fit Mary Hartman like a corset.” With her big droopy eyes and goofy smile, Lasser featured on the cover of Newsweek, People and Rolling Stone, but the pres- sure of recording 325 episodes in 18 months took its toll. She was arrested for cocaine possession and two months later in July 1976 made a car crash ap- pearance on the sketch show Saturday Night Live basically playing herself having a nervous breakdown. “It was the best and worst of times,” she said. She left Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman in July 1977 when it was near the top of the ratings. Louise Lasser was born an only child in New York City to Sol Lasser, an ac- countant who would make a fortune from publishing a series of layman’s guides to income tax, and Paula (née Cohen), an interior designer. Brought up, in the words of Allen, “knocking off escargot at smart restaurants on Fifth Avenue” (while Allen was eating Del Monte string beans from a can) she at- tended the fee-paying Fieldston school and studied political science at Brande- is University in Waltham, Massachu- setts. Suffering from depression, she soon dropped out.
homes. He controversially did not al- low the naming of prominent individu- als allegedly involved, stating: “Are names relevant? Allegations are made, not necessarily by the people who know, and repeated second-hand, against people who are not here to de- fend themselves.” Beck was convicted of multiple charges and sentenced to five life terms. Jowitt also handled the trial in 2001 in which Afghans fleeing the Taliban were convicted of the Stansted hijack- ing the year before. His rejection of the men’s defence of duress because of Tali- ban threats, and his assessment that there was “overwhelming” evidence for guilt, were overturned on appeal — prompting allegations of judicial leni- ency against the more senior court. He did not have legal connections nor had he been to a well-known school or to Oxbridge. Jowitt nonetheless reached on merit the upper ranks of the profession. In a powerful testament to the core principle of judicial independ- ence he told the Hamill inquiry: “We embark upon our task without any pre- conception as to where the truth lies. We are anxious to do all we reasonably can to discover that ... We are independ- ent of government or any other body or person ... The decisions and recommen- dations will be ours and ours alone. Nor shall we allow ourselves to be led or im- properly influenced by others, whoever they may be.”
Sir Edwin Jowitt, circuit and High
Court judge, was born on October 1,
aged 96
Lasser had first met Allen on a double date in 1958 when he was still married to Harlene Rosen. Encouraged by him, she started to make her name in im- provisational sketches performed at Greenwich Village coffee shops, took acting classes with Sanford Meisner and caught the eye in commercials. Lasser made her Broadway debut in the musical I Can Get It for You Wholesale in 1962 as an understudy for Barbra Strei- sand but her mental health remained frail, especially after her mother took her own life in 1964. She and Allen married in 1966 and as he moved from stand-up to screwball film comedies, her star rose too. In Ba- nanas she plays the earnest activist girl- friend of Allen who inspires him to join a revolution in a South American coun- try after dumping him — but not before a sex scene between Allen and Lasser’s characters which is televised in front of a live audience. After Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, Lasser continued to work intermittent- ly on comedy series such as Taxi and St Elsewhere and had an uncredited role in Allen’s Stardust Memories (1980). In later years Lasser, who is survived by her long-term partner, the film pro- ducer Michael Citriniti, ran the Louise Lasser Acting Studio on the Upper East Side. She would provide cameos in art- house films such as the acclaimed black comedy Happiness (1998). Allen la- mented “just how huge a star she could have been if she’d never had to fight an uphill battle all the way”.
Night Sky August
To use this chart hold it up so that the direction in which you’re looking is at the bottom of the chart. The bottom edge of the chart will then represent your real horizon and the centre represents the point directly overhead. The view is correct for the UK at midnight GMT on August 1, 11pm GMT on August 15 and 10pm GMT on August 31
Chris Lintott
August is a month filled with fascination for sky watchers, with a festival of celestial events headlined by a solar eclipse on August 12. From the British Isles, we miss out on the splen- dour of totality, but we do get a substantial partial eclipse on a summer’s evening. Timings depend on your pre- cise location, but the event starts at about 6.15pm, with maximum eclipse a little less than an hour later, before end- ing at about 8pm just ahead of sunset. From most of the region, more than 90 per cent of the Sun’s disk will be covered at maximum eclipse, the largest partial we’ll see before totality next visits these shores in 2090. Remarkably, even a 90 per cent eclipse is easy to ignore, as one’s eyes easily adjust to the changing light levels. The easi- est way to view a partial eclipse is to project an image of the Sun using a pinhole camera. A pin- hole in some card will do, though I often use a colander or tea strainer to produce multiple images; look out too for the nat- ural version, with images of the crescent Sun often projected onto the ground through tree leaves.
Special eclipse glasses can al- so be used to block most of the Sun’s light, but if they are left over from previous events do check them by looking at a household light first; those with any damage or pinpricks should be discarded. If the weather co-operates this should be an easy to observe and popular event. Weather might be more of a problem for those chasing totality, which fol- lows a thin path that stretches from the west coast of Iceland and across the Atlantic before crossing Spain. Such an event is one of na- ture’s grandest spectacles, with the black disk of the Moon sur- rounded by the pearly-white glow of the corona, the Sun’s outer atmosphere, planets and stars appearing in a strangely coloured sky and a sudden sense of the clockwork of the solar system operating in front of you. Conditions for those in the path of totality are difficult this time round, with cloud likely along most of the northern part of the track. In Spain, the event happens very close to sunset, making viewing difficult and in- creasing the risk that the crucial few minutes may be obscured by cloud. The noticeable drop in tem-
perature that occurs as the Moon occludes the Sun can also cause an eclipse microclimate, with clouds forming just when they are least wanted. If the weather does not co-op- erate, we can at least be comfort- ed that the next decent solar eclipse is due next August, with a track of totality that crosses southern Spain and Gibraltar before travelling across north- ern Africa, including Luxor. A substantial partial will be seen from the UK once again. Total solar eclipses are rare, with any given spot on the Earth’s surface experiencing to- tality only once every 300-400 years. We do, though, have two “eclipse seasons” each year, and two weeks after this month’s so- lar event, on the morning of August 28, a decent lunar eclipse will be visible. The full Moon, having com- pleted half an orbit since its pas- sage across the face of the Sun a fortnight earlier, enters the main (“umbral”) part of the Earth’s shadow just after 3.30am. At maximum eclipse ninety minutes later, 93 per cent of the lunar surface will be dark- ened, lit only by light refracted through the Earth’s atmosphere. The colour and brightness of the eclipsed surface thus depends
on the state of our planet’s at- mosphere, which is altered by climatic conditions and volcanic eruptions. On top of the month’s two eclipses, we have perfect condi- tions for the peak of the Perseid meteors on the morning of the August 13, with the Moon safely out of the way. The Perseids are the most reliable and best known of the annual meteor showers, with a predicted rate of tens of bright shooting stars an hour visible from the UK. Ob- serving is easy, and requires nothing but a comfortable chair and a view to the northwest or southeast. Perseids, which are debris from Comet Swift-Tuttle, will appear to come from a radi- ant in the northeast. The planetary sky is in a tran- sitional state at the moment, with Mars, Jupiter and Saturn all in the morning sky. The last of these is the best placed, shining brightly in Pisces and with two lunar conjunctions, on the 4th and 31st. The stellar sky, espe- cially on moonlit nights, pro- vides a glorious chance to ob- serve the summer Milky Way, stretching overhead in the mid- dle of the night, and passing through the easily recognised constellation of Cygnus, with its brightest star Deneb.
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BLESSED are the poor in spirit, for theirs is
the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5.3 (NRSV)
Bible verses are provided by the Bible Society
Births JOSHI on 16th July 2026 to Naiya and Dilan, a daughter, Tara.
Court Circular
Sandringham, Norfolk 25th July, 2026 The King was represented by the Very Reverend Professor David Fergusson (Dean of the Chapel Royal in Scotland) at the Funeral of the Reverend Charles Roberts (former Minister of Canongate Kirk, Domestic Chaplain to The late Queen and Extra Chaplain to The King), which was held at Canongate Kirk, Edinburgh, this morning. The Duke of Edinburgh was represented by the Very Reverend Professor Iain Torrance. The Princess Royal was represented by Mrs Charles Ritchie.
Legal Notices
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE CR-2026-001308 BUSINESS AND PROPERTY COURTS OF ENGLAND AND WALES COMPANIES COURT (ChD) IN THE MATTER OF U K INSURANCE LIMITED and IN THE MATTER OF AVIVA INSURANCE LIMITED and IN THE MATTER OF PART VII OF THE FINANCIAL SERVICES AND MARKETS ACT 2000 NOTICE Notice is hereby given that on 9 July 2026 an application, by CPR Part 8 Claim Form dated 9 July 2026, was made pursuant to section 107(1) of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (the “Act”) before the High Court of Justice, Business and Property Courts of England and Wales, Companies Court (ChD) in London (the “High Court”) by U K Insurance Limited (“UKIL”) and Aviva Insurance Limited (“AIL”) for Orders: 1. under section 111 of the Act sanctioning an insurance business transfer scheme (the “Scheme”) providing for the transfer to AIL of substantially all of the insurance business of UKIL (the “Transferring Business”); and 2. making ancillary provision in connection with the Scheme pursuant to sections 112 and 112A of the Act, (the “Application”). Copies of (i) the report on the terms of the Scheme prepared by an Independent Expert in accordance with section 109 of the Act (the “Independent Expert Report”), (ii) a guide setting out the terms of the Scheme and a summary of the Independent Expert Report, and (iii) the Scheme document may be obtained free of charge by contacting UKIL or AIL (as appropriate) using the relevant telephone number or the postal or email address set out below. These documents, and other related documents including sample copies of the communications to UKIL policyholders, are also available at aviva.co.uk/partvii-transfer from the date of publication of this Notice until the date of the Hearing (as defined below). The website will be updated with any key changes in respect of the proposed transfer, on a rolling basis. Any questions or concerns relating to the proposed transfer should be referred to UKIL or AIL (as appropriate) using the following email address, telephone numbers or postal address: By email: partviiqueries@ukipartnerships.com By telephone: If calling from within the UK: Freephone 0800 158 2502 If calling from outside the UK: +44 (0) 141 349 0202 Calls to the 0800 number are free from the UK. If calling from overseas you may be charged. International calls will be charged at the standard local rate; however, charges may vary depending on the network provider. Lines will be open from 9am-7pm Monday to Friday and 9am-5pm on Bank Holidays. Calls may be monitored and/or recorded. By post: UK Insurance Part VII Team PO Box 882 Surrey Street, Norwich NR7 7EX. The Application is due to be heard before a Judge of the High Court at 7 Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, London EC4A 1NL on 15 December 2026 (the “Hearing”). Any person (including any policyholder or employee of UKIL or AIL) who thinks that they would be adversely affected by the carrying out of the Scheme has a right to attend the Hearing and express their views, either in person or by a suitably qualified legal representative. It would be helpful if anyone intending to do so informed UKIL or AIL, in writing at the given addresses, ideally prior to 8 December 2026, setting out their reasons why they believe they would be adversely affected. Any person who alleges that they would be adversely affected by the Scheme but does not intend to attend the Hearing may make representations about the Scheme by: (i) telephoning UKIL or AIL (as appropriate) using the telephone number above; (ii) writing to UKIL or AIL (as appropriate) at the address or email, ideally prior to 8 December 2026, setting out their reasons why they believe they would be adversely affected. Anyone who thinks they would be adversely affected by the Scheme can object up to the date of the Hearing. All representations received up to the date of the Hearing will be provided to the High Court at the Hearing. UKIL and AIL will inform the Financial Conduct Authority, the Prudential Regulation Authority, the Independent Expert and the High Court of any objections raised in advance of the Hearing, regardless of whether the person making the objection intends to attend the Hearing. By submitting an objection to the Scheme, you consent to your objection and any personal data you provide with your objection being shared with AIL, the Financial Conduct Authority, the Prudential Regulation Authority, the Independent Expert and the High Court. If the Scheme is sanctioned by the High Court, it will result in the transfer of the Transferring Business from UKIL to AIL notwithstanding any entitlement that a person would otherwise have to terminate, modify, acquire or claim an interest or right, or to treat an interest or right as terminated or modified as a result of anything done in connection with the Scheme. Any such entitlement will only be enforceable to the extent the Order of the High Court makes provision to that effect. Slaughter and May One Bunhill Row London EC1Y 8YY Solicitors acting for UKIL and AIL
ASHDOWN Gavin on 20th July 2026, aged 53. Tricia and Leon Ashdown announce with great sadness the death of their elder son, Gavin, in California, after a cardiac arrest. A former Maidstone Grammar School pupil, he studied at Brunel University and University College, Oxford before realising his dream of working in the computer tech world in California. He is survived by his wife, Judy Reimann, and brother, Gordon Ashdown. Donations if desired to Cats Protection or Bearsted Woodland Trust.
St James’s Palace 25th July, 2026 The Duke of Edinburgh, Vice- Patron, Commonwealth Sport, today attended the XXIII Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
St James’s Palace 25th July, 2026 The Princess Royal, accompanied by Vice-Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, this afternoon attended King George Day at Ascot Racecourse, Berkshire.
Kensington Palace 25th July, 2026 The Duke of Gloucester, President, Three Choirs Festival, and The Duchess of Gloucester this evening attended a performance of “Belshazzar’s Feast” in Gloucester Cathedral and were received by Mrs Vivienne Hargreaves (Deputy Lieutenant of Gloucestershire).
Monday July 27 2026 | the times Weather
E
y
T
Today Sunny and hot in the southeast. Cloudy with drizzle in western areas. Max 28C (82F), min 11C (52F)
Around Britain
Key: b=bright, c=cloud, d=drizzle, pc=partly cloudy du=dull, f=fair, fg=fog, h=hail, m=mist, r=rain, sh=showers, sl=sleet, sn=snow, s=sun, t=thunder =previous day *=data not available
Sh
Sh
Temp C Rain mm Sun hr* midday yesterday 24 hrs to 5pm yesterday
14
C
3.4
3.2
18
C
0.4
4.0
20
PC
1.2
3.0
12
C
8.8
2.5
19
C
2.8
**
23
PC
0.4
**
17
R
3.8
0.2
22
C
1.8
**
25
PC
0.4 10.9
22
C
1.6
**
21
C
0.8
8.5
19
C
1.6
4.8
21
PC
1.8
7.2
18
R
11.6
4.6
18
R
3.8
2.0
18
R
3.6
4.5
21
R
0.2
**
22
R
1.0 11.5
25
PC
1.4 12.7
19
C
1.4
1.4
26
PC
0.0
**
20
C
0.6 11.4
17
C
6.4
**
13
**
2.2
5.3
15
R
4.2
**
11
C
2.0
0.8
19
C
1.4
5.1
22
C
0.2
6.8
17
R
3.4
**
25
C
0.0 11.9
23
PC
0.2 10.1
18
C
4.4
4.6
24
C
0.0 13.6
20
C
0.0
**
19
PC
5.2
**
19
C
0.0
6.4
13
C
2.2
**
24
C
0.0
**
21
PC
0.2
**
19
C
0.0
**
19
C
0.2
**
26
PC
0.0 13.1
20
C
0.0
5.8
15
R
6.2
**
27
PC
0.0 13.5
16
C
4.2
**
16
R
1.4
5.8
16
R
3.4
0.2
19
R
0.4
2.7
16
PC
0.2
**
21
C
0.0
8.5
Aberdeen Aberporth Anglesey Aviemore Barnstaple Bedford Belfast Birmingham Bournemouth Bridlington Bristol Camborne Cardiff Edinburgh Eskdalemuir Glasgow Hereford Herstmonceux Ipswich Isle of Man Isle of Wight Jersey Keswick Kinloss Leeds Lerwick Leuchars Lincoln Liverpool London Lyneham Manchester Margate Milford Haven Newcastle Nottingham Orkney Oxford Plymouth Portland Scilly, St Mary’s Shoreham Shrewsbury Snowdonia Southend South Uist Stornoway Tiree Whitehaven Wick Yeovilton
ney
ney
Birmingham
Oxford
The world All readings local midday yesterday
31 PC 20 SH 30 S
38 S 33 PC 25 SH 29 PC
31 S 27 S 30 B 26 B 21 B 27 S 30 S
31 PC 32 ** 7 PC 23 S 25 B 17 R 29 S 34 ** 41 S 18 B 27 S 29 PC 28 S 23 PC 30 S 18 PC 27 SH
25 PC 31 PC 17 S 31 PC
28 PC 28 PC 22 DU 28 S 24 B 41 S
Alicante Amsterdam Athens Auckland Bahrain Bangkok Barbados Barcelona Beijing Beirut Belgrade Berlin Bermuda Bordeaux Brussels Bucharest Budapest Buenos Aires Cairo Calcutta Canberra Cape Town Chicago Copenhagen Corfu Delhi Dubai Dublin Faro Florence Frankfurt Geneva Gibraltar Helsinki Hong Kong Honolulu Istanbul Jerusalem Johannesburg Kuala Lumpur Kyiv Lanzarote Las Palmas Lima Lisbon Los Angeles Luxor
Madeira Madrid Malaga Mallorca Malta Melbourne Mexico City Miami Milan Mombasa Montreal Moscow Mumbai Munich Nairobi Naples New Orleans New York Nice Nicosia Oslo Paris Perth Prague Reykjavik Riga Rio de Janeiro Riyadh Rome San Francisco Santiago São Paulo Seoul Seychelles Singapore St Petersburg Stockholm Sydney Tel Aviv Tenerife Tokyo Vancouver Venice Vienna Warsaw Washington Zurich
Five days ahead
Wind speed
Largely dry and hot in
the south. Breezier in
the north with rain or
showers at times
Tomorrow
Hot, dry and largely sunny across southern areas. Cloudier and breezier in the north and west with showers or rain, although with some bright periods. Max 29C, min 10C
Wednesday
Very hot and mainly sunny across southeastern Britain. Cooler in the northwest with showers or spells of showery rain, though with sunny spells in between. Max 33C, min C
Thursday
Sunny spells and scattered showers in the north and west. A few isolated showers are possible elsewhere, but generally dry and feeling hot once again. Max 30C, min 6C
General situation: Mainly dry, sunny and hot in the south. Cloud in the north and west with light rain and drizzle. E Anglia, London, Midlands, Cen S Eng, SE Eng, Channel Is, SW Eng, E Eng: A dry, hot and sunny day after any early light showers clear. Light to moderate westerly winds. Maximum 28C (82F), minimum 12C (54F). Cen N Eng, NW Eng, Lake District, IoM, Wales: A few showers in north Wales and northwest England, otherwise bright spells and variable cloud.
25 PC 26 S 28 S 30 PC 31 PC 14 DU 26 B 33 ** 27 PC 28 B 27 PC 18 C 30 M 23 S 20 B 30 PC 32 PC 26 PC 30 PC 32 PC 18 S 22 B 18 PC 30 S 16 S 22 S 23 PC 41 S 32 PC 21 PC 14 C 18 B 31 PC 29 PC 28 PC 24 B 17 PC 17 PC 31 PC 29 PC 32 PC 18 DU
29 S 28 S 24 B
Friday
Blustery with scattered showers across Ireland and northern Britain. Dry in the south with plenty of sunshine. Feeling cooler than recent days, but still warm in the southeast. Max 27C, min 6C
Tides Tidal predictions. Heights in metres. All times in local time
Today Ht Ht Aberdeen Avonmouth Belfast Cardiff Devonport Dover Dublin Falmouth Greenock Harwich Holyhead Hull Leith Liverpool London Bridge Lowestoft Milford Haven Morecambe Newhaven Newquay Oban Penzance Portsmouth Shoreham Southampton Swansea Tees Weymouth
Saturday
Dry and bright across southern parts of the British Isles. Blustery with scattered showers in the northwest, heavy at times. Max 26C, min 8C
The Times weather page
is provided by
Budapest, Hungary
Sea state
Glasgow Edinburgh
Plymouth Exeter Southampton
nd murkier later
Cloudier and murkier later with rain or drizzle over the hills. Light to moderate westerly winds. Maximum 22C (72F), minimum 15C (59F). Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Dundee, Borders, NE Eng: Areas of cloud may bring a few showers or spots of rain in the west later, otherwise dry with sunny spells. Light to moderate westerly winds. Maximum 19C (66F), minimum 12C (54F). N Ireland, Republic of Ireland: Overcast in central and northern areas with
13:23 3.6 06:22 10.7 18:49 11.3 10:53 3.0 23:12 3.3 06:14 10.1 18:43 10.7 05:00 4.5 17:20 4.8 10:50 5.8 23:15 5.8 11:25 3.5 23:29 3.7 04:42 4.3 17:01 4.6 --:-- -- 12:01 2.8 11:17 3.5 23:44 3.6 10:14 4.7 22:23 5.0 05:32 6.4 18:15 6.1 02:00 4.7 14:36 4.7 10:52 7.9 23:05 8.4 01:00 6.2 13:28 6.2 09:08 2.3 21:56 2.2 05:46 5.7 18:07 6.1 11:03 7.8 23:16 8.3 10:47 5.7 23:01 5.8 04:39 5.5 17:00 5.9 05:28 3.1 17:47 3.4 04:13 4.5 16:33 4.8 11:16 4.1 23:23 4.2 10:56 5.2 23:08 5.4 10:07 3.8 22:19 4.0 05:43 7.6 18:09 8.1 03:04 4.8 15:37 4.8 06:04 1.4 18:26 1.8
Synoptic situation A warm front drifts eastwards across northern and western parts of the British Isles, bringing cloud and outbreaks of light rain, mainly to western hills. A ridge of high pressure brings largely sunny weather across southern Britain and temperatures will rise once again. The ridge strengthens further tomorrow, while fronts continue to affect the north.
colourful cities, their scenic surroundings and the glorious “Blue” Danube.
capital of the Czech Republic, Prague, this hugely popular holiday takes you through the heart of Bohemia. Visit magnificent Vienna,
Orkney Shetland
ney ney
Carlisle Newcastle
21 16
Manchester Liverpool Hull
Sheffield
Shrewsbury Nottingham
outbreaks of rain. Drier in the south with the best of the brightness there. Light to moderate southwesterly winds. Maximum 23C (73F), minimum 15C (59F). SW Scotland, Glasgow, Cen Highland, N Isles, NW Scotland, NE Scotland, Argyll, Moray Firth: Cloudy with rain in western areas, with mist or fog over the hills. Drier in eastern parts of the region with sunny intervals. Light to moderate westerly winds. Maximum 17C (63F), minimum 11C (52F).
Hours of darkness Aberdeen Belfast Birmingham Cardiff Exeter Glasgow Liverpool London Manchester Newcastle Norwich Penzance Sheffield
22:02-04:29 22:04-04:58 21:38-04:51 21:39-05:01 21:37-05:05 22:04-04:44 21:46-04:51 21:26-04:48 21:43-04:48 21:48-04:38 21:26-04:38 21:42-05:15 21:40-04:45
Warmest: Frittenden, 27.4C Coldest: Cairngorm, 4.2C Wettest: Chillingham Barns, Northumberland, 26.6mm Sunniest: East Malling, Kent, 14.0hrs*
Sun and moon For Greenwich Sun rises: Sun sets: Moon rises: Moon sets:
05.16 20.56 20.19 03.28 Tue
Full moon: July 29
the very best coff ee and cake. See the cosmopolitan Slovakian capital, Bratislava, and the majestic “twin city” of Budapest, which sits astride the mighty River Danube. An opportunity to discover the rebuilt Baroque city of Dresden, on an optional excursion, completes your wonderful tour.
Weather Eye
Paul Simons
as a shock. The UK without rain seemed absurd, yet reservoirs dried up, water was rationed and farming was devastated as crops withered and died. The disaster led to the construction of new reservoirs, particularly the vast one created at Kielder, Northumberland, in 1981. Since then heatwaves have become longer, more frequent and more intense, with temperatures far exceeding 1976. The summers of 2018, 2022 and 2025 were among the hottest summers on record and 2026 is likely to follow suit. In winters too much rain has led to flooding. These are the disruptive effects of climate change, and more extreme weather is predicted in the future. Life in the UK is also much changed since 1976. The population of England has grown by 12 million and each person uses more water. In the 1960s and 1970s water use per person was about 100 litres a day, but it is now about 140 litres a day, more than France (110 litres) and Germany (125 litres). Washing machines, dishwashers and more powerful showers all use more water. A garden hosepipe can use 225 litres or more in 15 minutes. And despite more water metering in recent years, there has been no significant drop in the water people are using. The only fall in water use has come from the decline of many water intensive industries, which have moved overseas. At this rate we could have a shortfall of 5 billion litres of water a day by 2050, about a third of our current supply. That has brought calls for more major reservoirs to be built, more water transfer schemes, desalination projects and water recycling schemes. But we all need to cut our water consumption, helped by a new water efficiency labelling regulation for domestic appliances to highlight more efficient shower heads, taps and lavatories in the same way as labelling for energy-efficient appliances.
of our forecasters on 09065 777675
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S1 45
IPL owner to give Old Trafford upgrade
Elizabeth Ammon
franchise Manchester Super Giants has bought 2½ acres behind Old Trafford for several million pounds to build a state-of-the-art training facility. Lancashire’s new Indian partner, the RPSG group, owns 70 per cent of the Super Giants and also has Lucknow Super Giants in the IPL and the SA20’s Durban Super Giants in its portfolio. RPSG originally purchased 49 per cent of the Hundred franchise from the ECB and then bought a 21 per cent stake from Lancashire for £80 million. Dr Sanjiv Goenka, chairman of the RPSG group, said it was a conscious choice to invest millions into Manches- ter, both through the purchase of the Hundred team and through improving facilities at Old Trafford. “We could have chosen to do this [in] India but we chose to invest in Man- chester and Old Trafford because we really see the potential there,” he said in an exclusive interview with The Times. “Manchester has a tremendous sport- ing culture and Old Trafford stadium is amazing. I get goosebumps when I walk into the stadium. We understand the heritage of the place, and of Lancashire, and we want to build a legacy.” The piece of land, which is behind the indoor school, used to belong to Lan- cashire but was sold in 1962 and was most recently the site of a large B&Q store and freight land. The county had been trying to repurchase it but the RPSG group has been able to fend off interest from developers who had plan- ning permission for about 600 proper- ties. The group hopes to build its equiv- alent of the Nursery Ground at Lord’s. The footprint of the land is signifi- cantly bigger than the Nursery Ground and means Lancashire will have an out- door ground that can be used for train- ing. The investment will also allow for an upgrade of the existing indoor net fa- cilities, incorporating a gym as well as sports science and medical facilities.
Glasgow medal events only
Ward (Scot) 79.65pts; 2, F Dolci (Can) 79.45; 3, J Moore (Aus) 79.00; 5, A Tobin (Eng) 78.800.
52.90; 3, L-M Fontaine (Can) 52.80; 4, S-E Amankwaah (Eng) 51.55.
Women
Men: Freestyle: 50m 1, C McEvoy (Aus) 20.97sec (Games record); 2, F Southam (Aus) 21.44; 3, J Jack (Aus) 21.47; 7, J Mills (Eng) 22.19. 4 x 200m relay 1, Australia 7min 1.47sec (Games record); 2, England (G Shepherd, T Dean, J Guy, M Litchfield) 7:04.98; 3, Wales (M Richards, D Jones, K Bird, T Melbourne-Smith) 7:09.59. Backstroke:
2, O Morgan (Eng) 1:56.44; 3, L Greenbank (Eng) 1:56.58. Butterfly: 100m 1, J Liendo (Can) 50.42 (Games record); 2, M Temple (Aus) 50.43; 3, B Armbruster (Aus) 50.58; 6, E Mildred (Eng) 51.59. Women: Freestyle:
Fairweather (NZ) 15:58.97; 3, M Walker (Aus) 16:01.37; 7, A Blocksidge (Eng) 16:27.55.
2, K Masse (Can) 58.77; 3, O Nel (SA) 1:00.09; 5, L Cox (Eng) 1:00.35. Breaststroke: 100m 1, A Evans (Scot) 1:06.07; 2, A Canny (SA) 1:06.19; 3, S Toohey (Aus) 1:06.47.
(Malaysia) 299pts (Games record); 2, R Muthupandi (India) 286; 3, M Baru (Papua New Guinea) 282. 60kg 1, B Mohamad Aniq (Malaysia) 273 (Games record); 2, R Chanambam (India) 264; 3, J Mboya (Ken) 260; 7, K Stiles (Eng) 221. Women: 48kg 1, M Saikhom (India) 190 (Games record); 2, R Nyong (Nigeria) 168; 3, I Henry (Malaysia) 167; 5, T Wong (Eng) 160.
24.
women’s teams, as well as those in- volved in the Super Giants franchise network, will be able to use the facilities all year round. “It’s about building for the future,” Goenka said. “We will give the option to the fans to come and view the training sessions. This is something that will be available for all Super Giant franchises across the world, so they can come here and do camps and we can develop players, invest in them and the future.” That Lancashire’s IPL partner is in- vesting such a significant amount into the infrastructure of Old Trafford is a clear demonstration that RPSG is in it for the long haul. RPSG and the other private owners in the Hundred are aware that they may not see a return on their invest- ment for a number of years. The future profitability of the tournament will de- pend on it growing and developing over
The Hundred: Manchester Super
Giants v Birmingham Phoenix: Men
Old Trafford (Birmingham Phoenix won
toss): Manchester Super Giants (4pts) beat
Birmingham Phoenix by 87 runs
Manchester Super Giants (balls)
*A Markram c and b Ahmed 6 (9)
T Seifert c Clarke b Dwarshuis 1 (2) @J Buttler c Dwarshuis b Mahmood 90 (50)
H Klaasen c Ferreira b Ahmed 20 (11)
L du Plooy run out 13 (8)
T Moores not out 39 (17)
L Dawson not out 6 (3)
Extras (b 1, lb 5, w 6) 12
Total (5 wkts, 100 balls) 187
G Atkinson, N Ahmad, J Tongue and S Baker
did not bat.
not bat.
Fall of wickets 1-3, 2-45, 3-90, 4-113, 5-181.
Bowling Mahmood 20-5-33-1; Dwarshuis
20-7-33-1; Currie 15-5-28-0; Tariq 15-3-29-0;
Ahmed 20-5-43-2; Ferreira 10-1-15-0.
Birmingham Phoenix (balls) @J Clarke st Buttler b Dawson 20 (17)
W Smeed b Tongue 8 (8)
R Ahmed b Tongue 0 (1)
Le Evans c Seifert b Atkinson 13 (13)
*D Ferreira c du Plooy b Ahmad 23 (25)
M Owen c Atkinson b Baker 13 (7)
S Dickson c Atkinson b Dawson 2 (6)
B Dwarshuis b Ahmad 0 (1)
S Currie not out 14 (11)
S Mahmood b Baker 0 (1)
U Tariq c Baker b Dawson 2 (7)
Extras (b 1, lb 2, w 2) 5
Total (97 balls) 100
Fall of wickets 1-20, 2-20, 3-43, 4-43, 5-73,
6-81, 7-82, 8-85, 9-96.
Bowling Atkinson 20 (balls)-11 (dot balls)-20
(runs)-1 (wickets); Baker 20-10-25-2; Tongue
dends in increased value of broadcast rights, as well as full stadiums, mer- chandising and sponsorship revenue. “The Hundred has done brilliantly over the last few years,” Goenka said.
London Spirit (balls)
London Spirit (balls)
L-d Pretorius c Billings b Overton 24 (14) @J Bairstow c and b Overton 0 (2)
J Rew c Duckett b Harrison 26 (15)
*L Livingstone c Henry b Harrison 33 (24)
D Brevis c Santner b Amir 39 (24)
J Coles c and b Santner 2 (3)
J Overton c Harrison b Henry 9 5)
D Willey run out 11 (7)
A Tye b Gregory 7 (5)
A Milne not out 1 (1)
Extras (lb 2, w 5) 7
Total (9 wkts, 100 balls) 159
A Zampa did not bat.
Fall of wickets 1-9, 2-40, 3-64, 4-117, 5-127,
6-130, 7-143, 8-157, 9-159.
Bowling Amir 20-9-25-1; Overton 20-8-40-2;
Henry 10-2-29-1; Harrison 20-3-25-2; Santner
15-5-21-1; Gregory 15-8-17-1,
Trent Rockets (balls)
Trent Rockets (balls)
B Duckett c Coles b Tye 75 (47)
F Allen c Bairstow b Willey 0 (5)
T Banton c Rew b Tye 22 (14)
T David c Milne b Overton 9 (10)
*@S Billings c Brevis b Milne 22 (10)
M Santner not out 7 (4)
L Gregory c Coles b Milne 1 (3)
C Overton not out 20 (6)
Extras (lb 3, nb 1) 4
Total (6 wkts 98 balls) 160
C Harrison, M Henry and M Amir did not bat.
Fall of wickets 1-15, 2-87, 3-108, 4-109, 5-133,
6-135.
Bowling Willey 20-14-24-1; Milne 20-9-25-2;
Tye 20-4-35-2; Overton 18-5-30-1; Zampa
15-3-32-0; Livingstone 5-0-11-0.
Trent Bridge (London Spirit won toss):
London Spirit (4pts) beat Trent Rockets by
five wickets
K Garth not out 4 (4)
Extras (b 1, lb 2, w 4, nb 1) 8
Total (7 wkts, 100 balls) 142
S Bates and K Levick did not bat.
Fall of wickets 1-1, 2-34, 3-65, 4-71, 5-95,
6-130, 7-130.
Bowling Kapp 20-14-12-3; Dottin 10-2-32-0;
Dean 20-10-18-2; Pavely 20-2-32-1; de Klerk
20-5-30-0; Groves 5-1-7-0; Harris 5-1-8-0.
G Harris c Luff b Gardner 37 (20)
†A Jones c Jones b Elwiss 21 (19)
M Kelly st Mooney b Bates 39 (26)
M Kapp c Bates b Levick 2 (5)
S Kalis b Gardner 0 (2)
N de Klerk not out 41 (22)
C Pavely not out 2 (4)
Extras (lb 1, w 2, nb 1) 4
Total (5 wkts, 97 balls) 146
D Dottin, *C Dean, K George and J Groves did
Fall of wickets 1-55, 2-61, 3-63, 4-67, 5-130.
Bowling Bates 20-9-30-1; Garth 20-6-27-0;
Elwiss 15-4-25-1; Levick 10-4-22-1; Gardner
20-7-24-2; Adams 12-2-17-0. Men P W L T NR Pts NRR Manchester SG 2 2 0 0 0 8 2.35 Welsh Fire 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.53 MI London 2 1 1 0 0 4 0.29 Trent Rockets 2 1 1 0 0 4 -0.13 Leeds Sunrisers 2 1 1 0 0 4 -0.61 B’ham Phoenix 2 1 1 0 0 4 -1.92 London Spirit 2 0 2 0 0 0 -0.27 Southern Brave 2 0 2 0 0 0 -0.28 Women P W L T NR Pts NRR Southern Brave 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.35 Manchester SG 2 1 0 0 1 6 3.29 Trent Rockets 2 1 1 0 0 4 2.68 Welsh Fire 2 1 1 0 0 4 1.30 Leeds Sunrisers 2 1 1 0 0 4 0.94 London Spirit 2 1 1 0 0 4 -1.43 B’ham Phoenix 2 0 1 0 1 2 -7.77 MI London 2 0 2 0 0 0 -2.86
P W L T NR Pts NRR
P W L T NR Pts NRR
is not like instant coffee. It takes time.” Goenka is speaking from experience. He is a successful businessman with a net worth of about $5 billion (£3.75 bil- lion) and formed the Lucknow Super
Taunton Somerset 337-8 (L Goldsworthy
103, T Lammonby 85, J Thomas 50);
Warwickshire 212 (J Lintott 52; J Theedom 4
for 54). Somerset (4pts) won by 125 runs.
Guildford Northamptonshire 254-8 (N
McSweeney 64, G Bartlett 62; B Floros 4 for
60); Surrey 258-4 (A Thomas 83 not out, R
Patel 64). Surrey (4pts) won by six wickets.
Somerset 3 2 1 0 0 8 0.87
Notts 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.42
Surrey 3 2 1 0 0 8 0.27
Leics 3 2 1 0 0 8 0.11
Gloucs 3 1 2 0 0 4 0.22
Lancashire 2 1 1 0 0 4 0.00
Northants 3 1 2 0 0 4 -0.31
Kent 2 1 1 0 0 4 -0.68
Warks 3 0 3 0 0 0 -0.97
Group B: Chelmsford Essex 257-7 (T Westley
102); Derbyshire 248-9 (H Came 97). Essex
(4pts) won by nine runs. Radlett Glamorgan
66 (N Sharma 4 for 29); Middlesex 67-2.
Middlesex (4pts) won by eight wickets. Hove
Yorkshire 325-7 (W Luxton 117, S Whiteman
74); Sussex 140 (F Hudson-Prentice 50; B
Coad 5 for 12). Yorks (4pts) won by 184 runs
(D/L method). Worcester Worcestershire
307-8 (H Cullen 72, K Ali 65, D Lategan 64);
Hampshire 303 (T Prest 70, N Gubbins 57).
Worcs (4pts) won by 4 runs.
Middlesex 3 3 0 0 0 12 2.95
Yorkshire 3 2 1 0 0 8 0.98
Durham 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.78
Worcs 2 2 0 0 0 8 0.74
Essex 2 1 1 0 0 4 -0.32
Hampshire 3 1 2 0 0 4 -0.76
Glamorgan 3 1 2 0 0 4 -1.36
Derbyshire 3 0 3 0 0 0 -0.53
Sussex 3 0 3 0 0 -2 -1.81
that he and his team intend to take things they have learnt from the IPL and implement them in Manchester. The introduction of private invest- ment was one of the most radical changes to the fabric of English cricket. One of the concerns among some crick- et supporters was that the IPL owners had bought a prime five-week window at the height of the English summer. The negative impact of the Hundred on other elements of the cricket landscape — no international cricket or County Championship matches in that time, the squeezing of the T20 Blast, among other things — is undeniable, but the invest- ment by the RPSG group into Lancash- ire’s facilities, which will benefit the county’s male and female players of all ages, has to be a good thing. It is the op- posite of asset stripping, which was one of the concerns aired when the Hun- dred was put up for sale.
LIV Golf UK
Rocester: Leading final scores (Great
Britain and Ireland unless stated): 258
L Herbert (Aus) 61, 66, 69, 62. 264 T Hatton
66 68, 67, 63. 267 B DeChambeau (US) 64,
67, 68, 68. 271 C Smith (Aus) 69, 67, 66, 69.
274 C Surratt (US) 68, 69, 70 , 67; A Ancer
(Mex) 68, 70, 65, 71. 275 L Canter 73, 66, 70,
66; C Howell III (US) 68, 70, 69, 68; H Varner
III (US) 66, 69, 68, 72.
US PGA Tour 3M Open
Blaine, Minnesota: Leadera after three
rounds (United States unless stated): 193
J Koivun 64, 68, 61. 196 B Kohles 62, 69, 65;
E Grillo (Arg) 64, 67, 65. 197 M Brennan 65,
69, 63. 198 D McCarthy 66, 68, 64; B Horschel
67, 66, 65; M Kim 69, 59, 70.
Women’s Scottish Open
Irvine: Leading final scores: 279 J Shin
(S Kor) 66, 67, 71, 75. 281 A-Lim Kim (S Kor)
67 72, 74, 68. 283 P Anannarukarn (Thai)
71, 69 69, 74. 284 E Henseleit (Ger) 70 68,
73, 73. 285 L Coughlin (US) 66, 74, 74, 71;
M Yamashita (Japan) 70, 74, 70, 71.
Betfred Super League Leigh 28 Warrington
12; Leeds 42 Bradford 12; Toulouse 16
Catalans Dragons 18; York 22 Huddersfield
ATP Generali Open
Kitzbühel: Final Q Halys (Fr) bt A Bublik
(Kaz) 6-4, 7-6 (8-6).
ATP Millennium Open
Estoril: Final L Van Assche (Fr) bt A Blockx
Monday July 27 2026 | the times Sport Racing
Cathy Harris
her Team Europe line-up for the Solheim Cup, with the fringe players having their last chance to stake a claim at this week’s AIG Women’s Open at Royal Lytham & St Annes. The captain was keeping a close watch yesterday at the ISPS Handa Scottish Open, where Germany’s Es- ther Henseleit finished as the leading European in fourth place, behind the winner, Jenny Shin from South Korea, who ended a ten-year title drought with a two-shot victory over her compatriot Kim A-lim. The top two players in the Ladies European Tour (LET) Solheim Cup
Rob Wright
Rob Wright
Rob Wright
Rob Wright
5.15 Handicap (£4,397: 5f) (12)
5.50 Stakes (£5,400: 1m 2f) (5)
6.20 Stakes (2-Y-O: £5,400: 6f) (7)
6.53 Handicap (3-Y-O: £4,397: 6f) (6)
7.28 Handicap (£10,800: 6f) (14)
8.00 Handicap (£4,397: 1m) (9)
lowed by the top six players, not other- wise qualified, from the world rankings. Nordqvist has four picks while the USA captain, Angela Stanford, is restricted to three. The biennial event takes place at Bernardus Golf Club in the Nether- lands from September 11 to 13. Nordqvist, a three-times major win- ner who has played in nine editions of the Solheim Cup, remains an active player and was keen to do the job while still in regular contact with the players and caddies. The 39-year-old Swede said: “I know what’s going on and I don’t think the players are aware of just how involved I am. There’s so much specula- tion going on out there, but the truth is I’m not even sure who I’m going to pick.
8.30 Handicap
(3-Y-O: £3,768: 1m 2f) (8)
2.15 Stakes (2-Y-O: £7,020: 7f) (5)
2.45 Handicap (£4,187: 6f) (9)
3.15 Handicap (£5,234: 7f) (6)
3.45 Handicap (£3,664: 1m) (9)
4.15 Handicap (£5,154: 1m 2f) (7)
4.45 Handicap (£3,664: 5f) (9)
end of the day I’m trying to put together the best team to beat the Americans.” Nordqvist has shown extraordinary resilience in taking on the captain’s responsibilities after overcoming per- sonal trauma, admitting that the com- mitment had proved more consuming than she expected. A bitter divorce in 2024 took a huge toll on her, com- pounded by the subsequent sudden death of her former husband. “I’ve been to hell and back but I’ve rebuilt my life and am in a much better spot now,” Nordqvist said. “It’s one thing dealing with the players but there’s so much other stuff going on in the background. “It has been very mentally draining and exhausting, but I absolutely love
5.20 Handicap (£3,664: 1m 2f) (13)
2.30 Handicap (£3,978: 1m 6f) (10)
3.00 Stakes (£6,480: 1m 4f) (14)
3.30 Handicap (3-Y-O: £3,978: 1m 3f) (14)
4.00 Handicap (3-Y-O: £3,245: 1m) (14)
Nordqvist aims to reclaim the cup she
won four times as a Team Europe player
4.30 Stakes (2-Y-O: £15,462: 7f) (12)
5.00 Handicap (Div I: £5,234: 7f) (12)
5.30 Handicap (Div II: £5,234: 7f) (11)
6.05 Handicap (£5,234: 6f) (14)
Going: good to firm (good in places)
Going: good
2.30 (1m 6yd) 1, Asset (L Morris, 2-
13 fav); 2, Albemagic (4-1); 3, Feliz
Navidad (28-1). 1 l, 12l. M Prescott.
3.00 (5f 3yd) 1, Bolt Of Blue (B
Loughnane, 7-2); 2, The Mean
Fiddler (7-1); 3, Onslaught (13-2). 6
ran. NR: Sole Ruler. ns, 3 l. E
Dunlop.
3.30 (1m 6yd) 1, Polygram (R Scott,
7-2 fav); 2, Mount King (7-2 fav); 3,
Bradbury (6-1). 7 ran. 1 l, nk. T
Davidson.
4.00 (1m 6yd) 1, Holloway Boy (C
team around me who have all been on this journey and know what it takes.” After the Evian Championship, Nordqvist held a team practice session at Bernardus involving all those chal- lenging for picks. She describes the course as similar to Walton Heath, with water hazards, saying the ability to stop the ball on the raised greens is a huge advantage. Europe are aiming to wrest back the cup and Nordqvist has plenty of options to complete her line-up. Among the contenders are Germany’s Helen Briem, via the LET standings, and Nanna Koerstz Madsen, Leona Maguire, Julia López Ramírez, Mimi Rhodes and Ingrid Lindblad, on world ranking.
6.00 Handicap (3-Y-O: £3,664: 1m 2f) (7)
6.30 Stakes (2-Y-O: £5,757: 6f) (7)
7.05 Stakes (£5,234: 1m) (5)
7.40 Nursery (2-Y-O: £4,711: 6f) (6)
8.10 Handicap (3-Y-O: £7,731: 1m) (6)
8.40 Handicap (£3,664: 5f) (6)
5.00 (6f) 1, Go Victor (B Garritty, 28-
1); 2, Starsong (100-30); 3,
Battenburg Belle (17-2). 11 ran. l,
l. T Culhane & S Barclay.
5.30 (6f) 1, The Good Biscuit (J
Hart, 1-1); 2, Bell Shot (11-4); 3, Iris
Dancer (8-1). 4 ran. NR: Trilby. 1 l,
27 l. Mrs R Carr.
Placepot: £33.00Quadpot: £11.30
Jackpot:£4,828.90
2.12 (1m 7f 168yd hdle) 1, Hello
Garda (P Hanlon, 40-1); 2, Vietnorm
(8-11 fav); 3, Salkadan (5-2). 9 ran.
Lad (11-8); 3, War Correspondent
(28-1). 6 ran. NR: Diesel Line. 17 l,
1 l. D Elsworth & R Hatch.
3.42 (3m 10yd ch) 1, Hold Your Fort
(T Bellamy, 16-1); 2, Grand
Clermont (7-2); 3, The Flying Poet
(9-2). 7 ran. NR: Stans The Man.
1 l, 5 l. Mrs D Hamer.
4.12 (2m 7f 70yd hdle) 1, Idaho Fire
(J J Burke, 7-2); 2, Divilabother (15-
8 fav); 3, Tyson (13-2). 9 ran. 17 l,
37 l. J Owen.
4.42 (2m 4f ch) 1, At The Oche (H
Skelton, 11-10 fav); 2, Ras Kassar
(13-2); 3, Country Park (100-30). 10
ran. 1 l, 8 l. D Skelton.
5.12 (2m 3f 207yd hdle) 1,
Iraola plenty to ponder
Ian Whittell Nashville
Andoni Iraola’s first outing as Liverpool head coach ended with a 4-2 friendly win over Sunderland in Nashville on Saturday night. Here are five talking points from the pre-season game in the United States.
gomez adds to defensive woes Less than eight minutes had passed when Iraola was presented with his first major headache. Joe Gomez, 29, who had been named captain for the game, was substituted early with an unspeci- fied leg issue that added to the problems Iraola was already facing in defence. The exact injury, and prognosis, have yet to be revealed but Iraola said after- wards: “Probably the worst news has been straight away the injury of Joe. “We were happy because we were going through training without losing any players, and unluckily for us we’ve lost Joe straight away.” Jérémy Jacquet, the centre back signed for £60 million from Rennes, suffered a dislocated shoulder in Febru- ary while playing his first game after agreeing his summer transfer to Anfield. The 21-year-old is on Liver- pool’s tour to the United States but an injury kept him out of the opening game and he also looks likely to miss the match against Wrexham in New York on Wednesday. “With Jérémy, he’s had a lot of months without playing. He’s been training very well, but we’re going to take it easy with him,” Iraola said. “He will play probably in the last game of this US tour [against Leeds United in Chicago].” The centre of defence remains a problem, with Gomez having a long his- tory of injury setbacks that have cur- tailed his career. Virgil van Dijk, 35, is at home in Liverpool starting his pre-sea- son after a World Cup and club cam- paign in which he played more minutes than any outfield player in Europe. He is also out of contract at the end of the forthcoming season, as is Gomez. Giovanni Leoni, signed from Parma for £26 million last summer, played only one game last season before tearing his ACL and is still some way from a return. It meant Iraola had to play the 18- year-olds Mor Talla Ndiaye and Ifeanyi Ndukwe in the centre of defence for most of the game against Sunderland.
revival chance for elliott This summer was always expected to be a vital one in Harvey Elliott’s career — although, when last season started, that was because it looked likely he would be pushing for a place, even a key role, in Thomas Tuchel’s World Cup squad. The winger was coming off a stirring campaign with England Under-21, in which he was named player of the tour- nament at the Euros. Even when Arne Slot allowed him to join Aston Villa on loan — with the deal including an obli- gation to buy for £35 million if he ap- peared in ten league games — it seemed an ideal move to show Tuchel what he could do. Instead, he found himself unwanted by Villa, and because he played one minute of league football for Liverpool as a substitute against Newcastle United in August, he could not make another loan move and join a third club in the 2025-26 season. This summer is an opportunity for the 23-year-old to show a new Liverpool head coach what he is capable of. Though a first-half run-out against Sunderland, featuring an assist, hardly makes a case one way or another, he looked fit, lively and keen to make an impression.
can win titles with Rogers
Peter Rutzler Sydney
Jamie Gittens, the Chelsea winger, hopes £117 million signing Morgan Rogers can help the west London club raise the bar and win “everything” this season. Rogers completed his British- record transfer from Aston Villa last week, signing a seven-year deal. He will be joined by Maxence Lacroix, the France centre back, who has agreed a £52 million move from Crystal Palace. Gittens, who played alongside Rogers for England Under-21, may face more competition for his place. Rogers can, like Gittens, play from the left side. But the 21-year-old is confident Rogers can help Chelsea put a miserable season, when they finished tenth in the Premier League, behind them. “There was a buzz about him signing,” Gittens said. “We want to win everything. That is our ambition, to win the Premier League, the FA Cup and win anything that we’re in. Bringing in a player like Morgan will hopefully raise the bar to win titles.” Chelsea are in Sydney, Australia, as part of a pre-season tour that will also take in Hong Kong, Malaysia and Indonesia. This week they face Western Sydney Wanderers tomorrow and then Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday.
szoboszlai for vice-captain? Dominik Szoboszlai took the captain’s armband at half-time from Kostas Tsimikas, who had been given it when Gomez came off. Iraola was asked this week whether the 25-year-old may be made a vice-captain this season, especially after signing a contract extension at Anfield. The new head coach skirted around that topic, pointing out he has not even spoken to many of his squad yet due to the World Cup. Iraola made no secret of his delight at Szoboszlai’s new five-year deal, however, and sees him as a corner- stone of the club moving forward. His half-time introduction in Nashville, with the score at 1-1, certainly seemed to add a dimension to Liverpool’s play.
rising stars . . . and a veteran It is safe to say Rio Ngumoha has already established himself as a squad member at the very least, with the 17- year-old winger playing in 19 Premier League games last season. He show- cased more of the direct play and intri- cate footwork that Liverpool regulars have become familiar with. But the right winger Kieran Morrison, 19, had an impressive outing in Nashville, scor- ing the opening goal and looking a con- stant threat. His only first-team ap- pearances so far have been in cup games but there may be more to come. At the other end of the age scale, the 28-year-old Italian Federico Chiesa, who has made two Premier League starts in two full seasons at Anfield, scored and had a hand in Lewis Kou- mas’s fourth goal, giving a reminder of his pedigree.
more arrivals needed Jacquet and the Spain forward Victor Muñoz, from Osasuna, are the only sig- nificant new arrivals to date — albeit at a cost of nearly £100 million — but Iraola has made no secret of the fact he wants more. Iraola said he wanted “a winger” when pressed on the subject, but his desires clearly extend beyond a solitary new arrival.
Be there for Wales v England at the Principality Stadium, a Guinness Men’s Six Nations fixture where history, rivalry and campaign-defining pressure meet.
This exclusive package includes official match tickets and two hosted events with commenter legend Stuart Barnes, The Times’s Charlie Morgan and a celebrity guest speaker, for an experience that goes beyond kick-off. With a prime city-centre four-star hotel, you’ll also remain close to the stadium, restaurants and post-match debate. Insight before the whistle, atmosphere after it — and every detail handled from start to finish.
Hosted by Stuart Barnes Since hanging up his fly-half boots, Stuart is a columnist and match analyst for The Times and one of the country’s most incisive commentators on rugby.
Call 0808 291 4831 or visit thetimes.com/th-sixnations2027
Price includes
Gomez had to be replaced after eight minutes, leaving Iraola short in defence
• Two nights’ four-star stay at Future Inn Cardiff Bay with breakfast
• Pre-match Q&A with commentator legend Stuart Barnes, The Times’s senior rugby writer Charlie Morgan and a celebrity guest
• Captain’s Run access on Friday
• Official Cat A ticket (lower tier, try line area)
• Hosted welcome drinks
• Tour merchandise
Optional upgrade:
• Silver Hospitality upgrade for drinks and lunch
Monday July 27 2026 | the times Sport
Craig Lord
Commonwealth Games mantra tells us on every banner around Glasgow, but for Adam Ramsay-Peaty sport is now all about how it ends. The 31-year-old three-times Olym- pic champion took bronze — by just 0.05 seconds — in the 100m on Satur- day night in a time of 59.65sec, prompt- ing further questions about what is next for the greatest breaststroke sprinter in history. Why does he continue? And can he win at the Los Angeles Olympics in two years’ time? Speaking after winning that bronze, his focus was on inspiration, not under- standing limitation. “Why do I keep do- ing it? Because I have children, and people who look up to me,” he said. “If I quit when it’s hard, what message does it send to the people I love, but also to the rest of the world? “I stop when I’m done — and I’m done when I’ve really thought that I’ve extracted the best out of myself. I don’t think I’ve reached that yet.” In Glasgow, we saw a man who had lost his natural easy speed and ability to coast through the rounds with fuel tanks full for the final. What we wit- nessed was not a cutting-edge techni- cian with a powerful high-riding stroke of an engine, but a swimmer with fewer gears and a suspension that leaves him lower in the water. A 59sec 100m breaststroke is truly world-class excellence but looks ordi- nary in comparison with his earlier achievements. His world-record time of 56.88 seven years ago is a soaring measure of extracting “the best of myself” to become a house- hold name whose achievements are immortalised in history. Success was stunning but we are now witnessing something similarly striking in reverse. It was in Glasgow in 2014 that an 18-year-old newcomer to the senior ranks picked up gold in the Commonwealth 100m final in a time of 58.84. Four years on he kept the crown in what re- mains a Games record (58.59). That would have comfortably delivered gold in 2022 and 2026.
tirely clear. He missed a third Olympic 100m gold at Paris 2024 — by an ago- nising 0.02sec — and came “95 per cent” close to calling it a day. A long break followed, but when the IOC an- nounced that the 50m sprint would be added to the LA 2028 programme, Ramsay-Peaty made his comeback, saying he did not want to live with the “pain of regret”. Asked if the 100m was a realistic prospect, he said: “I don’t know . . . the 50 is probably my super-strength.” A source close to Team Peaty throughout those years on the rise told The Times: “In the past few years he’s faced some very steep challenges, but he still believes he can get some form of the best version of himself off the blocks. Maybe he can. This is a water- shed moment. He’s conflicted. That needs ironing out — and the dis- tractions of all those family issues need taking off his plate until the pur-
Ramsay-Peaty is kissed by wife Holly
after collecting his 100m bronze, left
That won’t be easy. Marriage plans with Holly Ramsay, the daughter of chef Gordon Ramsay, were ruptured by a family feud over arrangements stretch- ing from clothes to the use of social me- dia. It led to Ramsay-Peaty’s parents, Caroline and Mark, being excluded from the wedding last December, along with Adam’s brother James, who was arrested after the swimmer complained of his threatening behaviour on a stag do. Relationships remain fragile and the helpful influence of coach Mel Mar- shall is no longer there. Marshall is coaching in Australia, al-
ruled out. She was the swimmer’s coach when he delivered the news before the Tokyo Olympics that his partner at the time, Eiri Munro, a Welsh artist, was ex- pecting their son. Marshall came up with a plan — “Mission Home Team” — in which an entourage of people eased the burden on Ramsay-Peaty. Ramsay-Peaty moved to London re- cently and is now coached by another of Britain’s leading female coaches, Lisa Bates, at the Olympic pool, while he and Holly are expecting their first child together, a girl, in December. Speaking before the Tokyo Games, Marshall said: “When a baby arrives, there are challenges in terms of sleep deprivation and what that does to re- covery, but there is nothing that can’t be solved with a great conversation.” Under the circumstances, the ques- tion is: who’s going to have that conver- sation this time and ensure all roads lead to Ramsay-Peaty being in the form of the champion we know him to be by LA 2028? “That ‘home team’ will be es- sential if Adam’s going to get to LA in the kind of shape needed for gold,” the source said. “Or, the question has to be raised: is it time to move on?”
QUINN ROONEY/GETTY IMAGES
Evans shrugs off nerves to
make history for Scotland
Angharad Evans raised the rafters
at the Tollcross International pool
when she claimed Scotland’s first
Commonwealth gold in any
breaststroke event since the stroke
joined the Empire Games in 1930.
Her victory also delivered the
host nation’s first medal of any
colour in the 100m since Kirsty
Balfour’s bronze in 2006.
After reaching the final Evans,
who has spoken about suffering
from nerves, said she was “off to
watch Love Island to take my mind
off it”. But the home fans were
given credit last night when she
won in 1min 6.07sec ahead of
South Africa’s Aimee Canny.
A great cheer went up after
Evans addressed the stands: “I just
want to say thank you because it’s
so easy for doubts and negative
thoughts to play a part in my
mindset, and as I walked out you
just really uplifted me and gave me
the boost I needed.”
W
best – but Fury v Joshua will define legacies
John Westerby
“We’ve signed the contract. Every- thing’s done.” Those were the words of Eddie Hearn in the ring in Jeddah on Saturday night, shortly after Anthony Joshua’s dramatic second-round vic- tory over Kristian Prenga, having been asked whether his fighter’s long- awaited meeting with Tyson Fury would now take place. In recent years, there has been so much on-off speculation about a clash between the two most high-profile Brit- ish heavyweights of their generation that boxing fans will only believe the fight is happening when the two men walk into the same ring. But Joshua had kept his part of the bargain, surviving a first round in which he was knocked down twice by Prenga, the unheralded Albanian. He was revived by his corner and quickly took control in the second round, knocking Prenga out with a bru- tal right-left-right combination that was a reminder of the awesome power that made him a two-times world champion. The details of the Joshua-Fury clash, which could be one of the most lucrative in British boxing history, are yet to be decided, although Joshua has stated a firm preference for it to be held on British soil. “The only way the fight doesn’t take place in En- gland is if AJ and myself agree to it,” Hearn said. “We have a le- gally binding contract that took a long, long time to negotiate.” After his win against
Stuart Barnes
hat would Odysseus have thought had he found himself in the shoes of Dave Rennie, the New Zealand head coach whose men have been put on a World Cup knockout collision course next year with the powerful South Africa and the razor- sharp, dangerous France? He would have said: “Let’s get out of this deadly half of the draw. Let’s find easier pastures from where we can steer our lads through the nightmare of the knockout stage.” There’s a time to stand and fight, and a time to cut and run. Rennie, like an Olympian shrouded in the
Prenga, Joshua called out to the crowd in the Jeddah Superdome to see whe- ther Fury was present. He was not in Saudi Arabia, having held his own warm-up fight a day earlier in Thailand, where he stopped Mariusz Wach, a 46- year-old from Poland, in seven rounds. But Fury duly posted on social media to confirm that Joshua was firmly in his sights. “The biggest fight in British his- tory,” he wrote. “Let’s see if he got the balls to fight in November. I’ll be ready. Let’s rock and roll. Over a decade in the making.” While Joshua was the overwhelming favourite to beat Prenga, a defeat would undoubtedly have thrown the Fury fight into considerable doubt. At 36, it would have also raised doubts about Joshua’s future, given his lack of recent victories against credible opponents. Joshua beat Jake Paul, the YouTuber, in an exhibition match in December but lost against Daniel Dubois at Wembley almost two years ago. His four victories preceding that sting- ing defeat were against the UFC fighter Francis Ngan- nou, Otto Wallin, Robert He- lenius and Jermaine Franklin. Likewise Fury, who fol- lowed up back-to-back defeats against Olek- sandr Usyk in 2024 with wins against Arslanbek Makh- mudov (unanimous decision) and Wach. His gripping trilogy against Deontay Wilder, fought for the WBC heavy- weight title, feels a long time ago. Joshua’s win against Paul had been followed by the trau-
garb of an old-fashioned Kiwi coach, demands optimism from his men. The way the All Blacks have started under him has fuelled hope that New Zealand can be competitive in the forthcoming Test series in South Africa that has been billed the “Greatest Rivalry”; escaping home without a hammering and in shape to plot victory at the 2027 World Cup. The road to a World Cup trophy is a journey fraught with difficulties. As it stands, given the tournament draw, it would be an amazing adventure for New Zealand to even reach the final. A pool match with the host nation, their great rival Australia; then, if the seeds qualify from their pools as they should, a quarter-final against their mightiest and most cunning of adversaries, South Africa; and a semi- final against what could be a fearsome French team. Odysseus thought the Olympians had it in for him, so too it seems with the rugby gods for New Zealand. The best teams are fighting it out to reach
Joshua, who paid tribute to his friends killed in a crash in Nigeria after defeating
Prenga on Saturday, will need to improve his defence before facing Fury, left
the final on one side. Meanwhile, England could be struggling to find a balance between forwards and backs, between kick-and-run, between offload and taking the tackle, but their World Cup run looks favourable. In 2023 the world’s elite transformed quarter-finals into semis as the best four teams scrapped it out with one another a round early. Ireland and France fell at the quarter- final stage, while England and Argentina found themselves in the semi-finals. England’s prayers were almost answered again as a levelling fall of rain resulted in Steve Borthwick’s team almost making the final against a far superior South Africa side. Meanwhile, New Zealand thrashed Argentina — South American pretenders who, bar luck, had no place to be in the last four. Eventually, the world’s great powers made the final, with South Africa lifting their fourth trophy. Rennie would avoid the “premature” New Zealand-South
Africa quarter-final (and the dangerous French a week later) if Australia win pool A instead of them (on the assumption that South Africa and France win their pools, as is expected). The gods who oversee the game wouldn’t like that, but what is the object of the tournament: to win it or to leave the field against South Africa or France as heroic losers? What happens if New Zealand lose against Australia? Well, first things first: the winning won’t be straightforward anyway. The Wallabies will be fired up by their ageless rivals. They have a big game in them but their new coach, Les Kiss, has not inherited a team with the structure to win the whole competition. An Australia win would light up the tournament. And it would put Rennie’s men on a path where monsters like France and South Africa do not abound. The other repercussions? An easy round of 16 game is followed — in all probability — by a quarter-final clash
matic car crash that loomed over Josh- ua’s preparations for the Prenga fight. Travelling as passengers on the Lagos- Ibadan Expressway in Nigeria, two of Joshua’s friends were killed in the crash, while he was treated in hospital for rela- tively minor injuries. He came into the ring with the names of his two friends — Sina Ghami, his strength and condi- tioning coach, and Latif Ayodele, his personal trainer — on his lapels. He al- so paid tribute to his friends and their families afterwards. “It was more than punch power,” he said of his victory. “That was spirit, that was Latz, that was Sina, that was the families.” When Joshua was knocked to the canvas within 20 seconds in the first round, Hearn felt the prospect of the Fury fight slipping away and wondered whether Joshua, after all the trauma he had endured in recent months, might have made too swift a return to the ring. “No one can imagine what he’s been through these past seven months,” Hearn said. “During that first round, I was thinking, ‘He’s come back too soon.’ But he needed boxing to help him get through this, while he was dealing with so much grief and pain. He’s a strong man, he likes to deal with his problems on his own. I’m not saying that’s the right way to do it, but that’s his way to do it. Even to be in the ring tonight was astonishing.” But the way that Joshua bounced back in the second round was a remind- er of both his abilities and why he re- mains such a box-office attraction. “When you go down a couple of times in the first round and you’re looking like your career could be over, he had to go to the depths,” Hearn said. “To get up and fight on, like he’s always done, like he’s done these past seven months.” The vulnerabilities that Joshua showed in that first round against Pren- ga will undoubtedly have set Fury’s juices flowing. Over the past year, Josh- ua has been working with Usyk and his trainer, Iegor Golub, who did an im- pressive job of keeping Joshua’s focus after that humbling first round. But they know the weaknesses in his de- fences exposed by Prenga will need to be worked upon before facing Fury. There will be no belts on the line when the two former world champions meet and both are past their respective peaks. Neither Joshua nor Fury would be coming into the meeting with an auspi- cious recent record behind them. But that is unlikely to diminish the broader interest in a fight that has been so long in the making — a fight that, whatever their prior achievements, will shape the legacy of these two iconic British heavyweights.
with England. Take your pick, Kiwis: England or South Africa as opponents? Come the semi-final, Argentina or the winners of the Ireland-Scotland pool-stage match hypothetically await the All Blacks. Rennie’s side would be on cruise mode on the weaker side of the draw. Winning the World Cup isn’t a matter of winning every game. South Africa have proved that. Maybe they were not as distraught as we thought when New Zealand beat them in the pool stage in 2019. The All Blacks set themselves up for a semi-final against the giant English pack, while Wales were washed away by Rassie Erasmus’s team. Rennie, of course, will do everything within his power to win the World Cup. It is not a matter of throwing the headline pool game against Australia but perhaps using it as an opportunity to test combinations, in the knowledge that one defeat would be anything but the end of their world.
hopes fade as Norris seals a first win of year
Molly Hudson
Formula One
Correspondent,
Hungaroring
World champion Lando Norris ended a barren run of 259 days without a grand prix victory in a chaotic race in Buda- pest, which may well prove to be crucial in the future crowning of Kimi Anto- nelli as this season’s title winner. McLaren’s “Papaya Rules”, which allow the drivers to race each other fairly, dominated last season but they were lacking here, as Norris fortuitous- ly gained the lead when Oscar Piastri was crashed into by Carlos Sainz. But the Briton had the better pace and ulti- mately deserved victory, his first since November last year at Interlagos. Max Verstappen finished runner-up, to his own bafflement given his con- tinued complaints about his Red Bull. “I still don’t really understand how we are second,” he said. Antonelli managed third — some- how finishing ahead of his biggest title rival Lewis Hamilton despite the Mer- cedes being off the pace all weekend. In the words of Toto Wolff, Antonelli’s team principal: “Lewis was the one [ex- pected to] to win this race on Saturday morning.” On a weekend that seemed crucial for Hamilton’s title hopes, he was left downbeat by a three-place grid penalty after qualifying for impeding Piastri and then received another infringe- ment for speeding in the pitlane by 0.1km/h over the 80km/h limit during the race. The five-second penalty de- moted him to fifth behind his Ferrari team-mate, Charles Leclerc, and leaves him 50 points behind Antonelli in the standings. For Norris, the opening lap brought the return of an unwel- come problem that hampered him last season — a failure to re- tain the lead from pole position. All of his good work 24 hours earlier to produce a brilliant lap was undone when he ran wide at turn 2 on to the dirty side of the track, allowing Piastri to snatch the lead. Ferrari had opted for soft tyres while the rest of their competitors were on medi- ums — Hamilton had a new set while Leclerc’s were used from qualifying on Saturday. Leclerc dropped to fifth, struggling for grip, and losing position to his team-mate.
George Russell encountered another problem to add to his long list of bad luck and mechanical issues this season — his new power unit hit anti-stall as he attempted to launch off the line, drop- ping him to 21st. “It seems it’s another problem that happened to George,” Wolff said. “It looks like he gave about 10 per cent throttle and the whole thing revved [to the] maximum, he went off the throttle and it bogged down. I’m really not happy about too many mis- takes [from the team] that happen.” Russell’s title hopes appear to be slip- ping away; he eventually recovered to seventh, but haemorrhaged more championship points. The Hungaroring circuit is often de- scribed as Monaco without the walls and is hardly an ideal track to recover places. Teams and drivers had antici- pated that the “overtake” mode avail- able to them this year would be less powerful than the DRS of last season, making track position key. Hamilton was the first to pit on lap 14 and thought he had perfectly utilised the undercut (pitting a lap earlier than competitors and then utilising fresh tyres) despite having to overtake Arvid Lindblad. Verstappen came out behind them but produced a quite brilliant double overtake at turn 1, down the in- side of both. The team radio of the two cars could hardly have been more dif- ferent, with Verstappen’s race engineer praising his driver for a “quite special” overtake, while Hamilton apologised for giving the position away, knowing he would spend the next period of the race stuck behind the Red Bull. Norris was similarly frustrated be- hind Piastri, believing he had the faster pace. It looked for a long period as though he would not be able to show it, despite his radio complaints, before the intervention of Sainz. The Williams driver was being lapped, but was also fighting an Aston Martin for position, and banged wheels with Piastri. “Get out of the way you f***ing idiot,” Piastri said, in a rare mo- ment of genuine fury from the Australian. Sainz received a five-second penalty for causing a collision. The incident cost Piastri a sig- nificant portion of lap time and allowed Norris an unlikely overcut, ef- fectively for the lead. “Nice of you guys to factor that one in by the way, thanks,” Piastri told his race engineer, feeling he should have been allowed to take his place
Norris enjoys his moment on the podium after Hamilton, right,
was given a five-second penalty for driving just 0.1km/h too fast
in the pitlane. He had rejoined the track, above, ahead of title
rival Antonelli, left, but was demoted to fifth place
back from Norris. When informed that his tyres needed to last until the end, he replied: “Oh mate, just don’t f***ing talk to me now.” They did not need to as it happened, with a gearbox failure causing Piastri to pull to the side of the track, joining both Cadillacs in retiring. Several backmark- ers caused chaos during the race, with the electronic blue flag system faulty. Norris probably deserved the luck, given his title defence has been plagued by poor reliability and a struggling McLaren. “My pace today was probably some of the best I’ve ever had. The car
was beautiful to drive and I had confidence,” he said, claiming his first victory with the No 1 on his car. Both Ferraris pitted under the virtual safety car that resulted from Piastri’s retirement and Hamilton was forced to give up the position he thought he had gained on Antonelli, as replays showed the Mercedes driver was ahead at the pit exit. Hamilton felt he should not have pit- ted in the first place, preferring to main- tain track position and possibly lose a place to Verstappen but attempt to stay
ahead of Antonelli. “The call came lit- erally just before the pitlane entry, and I didn’t have time to debate,” Hamilton said. “You’ve got to trust the decision that’s been taken. In hindsight, my tyres were totally fine.” Then came the now familiar sight of car No 44 — Hamilton — being investi- gated by the stewards. Meanwhile, it was confirmed that Formula 1 will return to Malaysia from October 2-4, with the Sepang International Circuit host- ing the Bahrain Grand Prix. The circuit, which last hosted an F1 race in 2017, will rejoin the calendar this year with financial backing from the Kingdom of Bah- rain. It is impossible to stage the race in Bahrain itself because of the ongo- ing conflict in the Middle East. “Once again, the sport has demonstrated its ability to adapt, find solutions, and deliver, creating an excit- ing moment for everyone who follows Formula 1,” Stefano Domenicali, the president and chief executive of F1, said. While a decision will not be made until later in the season about whether or not races can be held in Qatar and Abu Dhabi, contingency options in- volve a return to Europe, with Imola the most likely destination.
S1 51 Tour de France Sport
How they finished
How they finished
L Norris
1hr 39min 56.180s
McLaren
McLaren
M Verstappen Red Bull
M Verstappen Red Bull
Red Bull
K Antonelli Mercedes
K Antonelli Mercedes
Mercedes
C Leclerc Ferrari
C Leclerc Ferrari
Ferrari
L Hamilton Ferrari
L Hamilton Ferrari
I Hadjar Red Bull
I Hadjar Red Bull
G Russell Mercedes
G Russell Mercedes
L Lawson Racing Bulls
L Lawson Racing Bulls
Racing Bulls
N Hülkenberg Audi
A Lindblad Racing Bulls
G Bortoleto Audi
P Gasly Alpine
P Gasly Alpine
Alpine
L Stroll Aston Martin
F Alonso Aston Martin
F Colapinto Alpine
E Ocon Haas
Haas
A Albon Williams
C Sainz Williams
O Piastri McLaren
greatest of all champions
Overall standings
+15.080s
+18.728s
+23.840s
L Norris McLaren
+24.540s
+55.488s
+57.503s
+1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
1 lap
C Leclerc 1:22.000 Fastest lap
Constructors’
2 lap
2 lap
2 lap
2 lap
+2 lap
continued from back
up that hill and had an eight to ten-sec- ond gap at the top. For most riders, that would not have been nearly enough. These two, though, were determined to give it a go. It is what makes Pogacar the rider that he is. He had already won five stages in this race and, with a 6min 26sec lead on second-placed Remco Evenepoel overall, he didn’t need to win again. As well as that, this tight circuit through Montmartre wasn’t without danger. The sports directors in his team would rather he stayed away from this kind of racing but they realised a long time ago that Tadej will do what excites him. Of course he didn’t need to win but he had to race. Once he and Van der Poel got their gap, they shared the pacemaking and, though chased furiously by a small group of counterattackers and the pelo- ton behind them, they edged their ad- vantage out to 13 seconds. With his big- ger physique, Van der Poel was slightly stronger than the Yellow Jersey but how Pogacar contributed to the joint effort. With two kilometres remaining, the peloton was being driven by three Decathlon riders and they were eating into the advantage of the two leaders. Ten seconds became eight, then five. As the leaders swept round the Rue de Rivoli and onto the Champs-Élysées for the final time, their lead was four seconds. Pogacar was the one who cracked, his complete exhaustion forc- ing him to slow just as the peloton got to him. That was 200 metres from the line. It was almost as if Van der Poel knew that this was how it was going to end. He still had something left. Just as the chasers were about to roll over him, he accelerated one last time. Philipsen was part of the chasing group but Van der Poel’s last surge kept him in front. Phil- ipsen was able to sprint while keeping his eye on his team-mate. When it was clear that Van der Poel was going to hold on, Philipsen didn’t force it and settled for second place. Could he have won himself? Prob- ably. But he understood that after the breakaway in Montmartre and the ride to stay clear, it was right that Van der Poel should win. It was an exceptional moment at the end of an exceptional race. “It was an incredible battle,” Van der Poel said. “It was super hard, and to be up there with the best rider in the world, my respect to Tadej. I thought we were going to get pegged back but I just put my head down in the last 500 metres and was just waiting for the others to come past but it didn’t happen.” In defeat, Pogacar’s performance was admirable. He races like a kid trying to win his first race. Riding this final stage in his seventh Tour de France like he’d never won a race. Losing in these cir- cumstances won’t bother him. He gave all that he had. It’s not like he leaves empty-handed. This is his fifth Tour victory and it puts him on the same number as Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Induráin. This new status is not some- thing he seeks. To him, being a five- times Tour winner isn’t much different to being a four-times winner. Such has been his brilliance since his breakthrough year in 2019 that it’s nat- ural for us to wonder how good he is. Many will have forgotten that his first Tour de France finished on a Septem- ber Sunday in 2020. Covid had pushed the Tour out of its midsummer home into an autumn rental. Harder to forget
219pts
379pts
Pogacar passes the Arc de Triomphe
Stage 21 (Paris — Champs-Élysées, 88.7km):
1, M van der Poel (Neth, Alpecin-Premier Tech)
1hr 58min 49sec; 2, J Philipsen (Bel, Alpecin-
Premier Tech); 3, M Pedersen (Den, Lidl-Trek)
all same time.
Overall 1, T Pogacar (Slove, UAE Team
Emirates-XRG) 73:56:26; 2, R Evenepoel (Bel,
Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe) 6:26; 3, I del Toro
(Mex, UAE Team Emirates-XRG) 9:42. Leading
British 9, T Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5 Pro) 29:28.
Points 1, Pedersen 559. King of Mountains 1, R
Carapaz (Ec, EF Education-EasyPost) 156pts.
Young rider 1, Del Toro 74:06:08.
last day of that race. With a 57-second deficit on leader Primoz Roglic, no one gave him a chance. Roglic excelled against the clock and no matter what Pogacar did, 57 seconds seemed too much. Even now, the numbers are no less astonishing. Pogacar went 1min 56sec faster than Roglic in a 36-kilome- tre time trial. The Tour was his by 59 seconds, the second-youngest winner in the history of the race. We knew then he was special and that if he could turn freakish talent into sustained perform- ance, he’d become one of cycling’s greats. He has gone much further than that. For a couple of years I’ve come to the view that he’s the greatest I’ve seen. Superior to the great champions in other sports. When we say he’s now got his fifth Tour de France victory, all we do is reduce his greatness to the bottom line. As if his career is dedicated to tick- ing off victories. Everything is in the de- tail of his story, which makes him very different to all the other cycling champions, with the possible exception of Merckx. For example, 44 years ago I first stood on the Champs-Élysées on the last Sun- day in July. That was Hinault’s fourth Tour and that year there was much tut- ting about the French rider’s failure to win a road race stage through the first three weeks. Hinault did then win on the Champs-Élysées and quietened the noise. When Pogacar wins the Tour, his overall victory comes with three or four or five or even six stage victories. Unlike so many of cycling’s other Tour champions, the three-week race is just one area of Pogacar’s dominance. He wins most of the one-day classics he races, all of the one-week stage races. He wins on the cobbled climbs in Flan- ders, then on the short but steep hills in the Ardennes and on the unpaved roads of Strade Bianche in Tuscany. He is a Federer as comfortable on clay as grass, a Tiger Woods as good in the Georgia pines as Scottish linksland. For some, his incontrovertible domi- nance diminishes excitement. How can
the end of the first week we feel we already know the winner? The counter argument is that he wins by attacking and there is something intrinsically ex- citing about the way he races. Who could describe his victory at Alpe d’Huez in Friday’s 19th stage as any- thing other than exhilarating? There is huge admiration for the way he’s dealt with extraordinary success and the challenges that come with it. After he won that time trial on La Planche des Belles Filles in 2020, two of the riders he beat, Roglic and Tom Du- moulin, questioned the authenticity of that performance in a documentary, Code Yellow. What they said came in the immediate aftermath of the per- formance, at a moment when they would have been in a state of shock. Dumoulin, beaten by 1:21, said: “A minute and a half! I can’t think of a single solution how the hell I could have gone a minute and a half faster.” Roglic was equally incredulous. “What a big difference,” he said. “They have to calculate what power you have to do to achieve that. That’s a different world of cycling.” The documentary came out six months after Pogacar’s first Tour vic- tory and Pogacar said of the comments: “They hurt.” Dumoulin now sings to a different tune. “I love watching him race,” he said of Pogacar last October. “He’s perhaps the greatest cyclist of all time, and it’s special to see the best win almost every race.” At the following year’s Tour de France, Pogacar delivered another su- perlative performance in an individual time trial and beat Roglic by 44 seconds. There were no complaints this time, just a better understanding of Pogacar’s class. Still, this is cycling, and many hold onto their scepticism like it’s a crucifix, unable to consider that maybe this guy is winning in the right way. Through the seven years of his time on the World Tour, Pogacar has shown most of the qualities that the greatest champions have. He won his first two Tours, 2020 and 2021, and thought it was easier than it was. Caught out and worked over by Roglic and Jonas Ving- egaard on the early slopes of the Col du Galibier on the 11th stage in 2022, he then lost almost three minutes to his ri- val on the Col du Granon. Vingegaard beat him again the following year. It was then that Pogacar decided to look at everything he did and see where he could improve. He was outstanding in the 2024 Tour, winning six stages on his way to an emphatic victory. All of his team-mates speak about how much more relaxed he is now and it was clear that he is now an exception- al leader of the team. His gifting of the Barcelona stage to his youngest team- mate, Isaac del Toro, was one of the highlights of the first week and then, on the penultimate day, he sacrificed the likelihood of another stage victory so Del Toro held on to the White Jersey for best young rider and overall third place. One of my favourite memories from this year’s Tour is of the moment Poga- car joined up with Adam Yates as they climbed Alpe d’Huez on Friday. Yates wasn’t quite himself as Pogacar was chasing down Richard Carapaz but Po- gacar didn’t panic, rather he allowed Yates to do what he could before Poga- car accelerated away. Soon he was again cutting Carapaz’s lead and would overtake him in the last kilometre. The way he allowed Yates to play his part in that victory was smart and sen- sitive. It’s not hard to understand why his team-mates think so highly of him.
Monday July 27 2026 | the times Sport
Dutch rider Mathieu van der Poel, right, of Alpecin-Premier Tech wins the final stage of the Tour de France after a thrilling sprint finish down the Champs-Élysées
Peter Rutzler
Paris Saint-Germain are willing to sell the France winger Bradley Barcola but want a fee of £145 million. Liverpool and Arsenal are thought to be interested in Barcola, but PSG are not actively planning to sell the 23-year-old and do not want to part company on the cheap. The European champions are internally citing recent deals for Elliot Anderson, who joined Manchester City for £116 million, and
Times Crossword 29,605 across down Prize solution 29,598
Morgan Rogers, who moved to Chelsea for £117 million, as inflationary bench- marks for his valuation. Though PSG hold Barcola in high re- gard, their head coach, Luis Enrique, only wants players who are totally com- mitted to the club. He did not start either of their wins in the past two Champions League finals and his min- utes are split amid competition from Désiré Doué, Ousmane Dembélé and Kvicha Kvaratskhelia. PSG were seek- ing to sign Yan Diomandé, the RB Leip-
zig winger. However, yesterday they withdrew from contention, with club sources citing “disproportionate” wage demands and a high transfer fee. Dio- mandé is instead expected to join Real Madrid. Barcola has had a remarkable rise. He was on the verge of being dropped to Lyon’s reserves in 2022 when he burst into first-team contention on a trip to Dubai — where he faced Liverpool and Arsenal in matches during the Qatar World Cup. By the next summer, his
1 Writer of Spanish verse can’t go
wrong (9) 6 Artificial wetlands surrounding you
(5) 9 Spotted mole outside country
house briefly (7) 10 Blooming newspaper leading
European anger (7) 11 What’s eaten by many Americans?
(3) 12 Horse perhaps quickly prepared to
throw first knight just as far? (11) 14 Uncover error by Chambers in
Early English (6) 15 Muse following second Democrat’s
going with reasonable speed (8) 17 A top zoo desperately holding river
animals in a single cell (8) 19 Position lacking over common
drug (6) 22 Excellent joke card’s written about
old queen (11) 23 Crustacean’s innards not at all
cooked (3) 25 One of twelve letters in “some pub
drink” (7) 27 Strong flavour I recognise in
unwrapped American sweets (7) 28 Judge succeeded with tense
Path cleared for British icons to meet . . . but no belts on line
impact had been so impressive he was courted by PSG and signed for €50 mil- lion (£42.5 million). He has made 152 appearances for the club, registering 39 goals and 37 assists, and is now a regular for France’s national team. He featured in each of his nation’s eight matches at this summer’s World Cup in North America, scoring three times. Arsenal recently missed out on Rogers, who moved to Stamford Bridge from Aston Villa for a British-record fee. Liverpool have looked at Dioman-
1 Soft copper nervous around others
(5) 2 Herring cleaner’s after money from
America (7) 3 Deal with personal hygiene matter
correctly as a help with contacts (7,4) 4 Test something unknown found in
fish (3,3) 5 Avalanche — a sign spring is on its
way? (8) 6 One that might have a flutter in
club (3) 7 City managed promotion in key
area (7) 8 Crop Ceres won’t fancy (9) 13 Shaken with thief waving weapon
(6,5) 14 Hopeful, still living outside quiet
central London zone (9) 16 One may need a push to enter
disreputable bordello (8) 18 Labour’s abandoned place for
testing speech-making (7) 20 Agony of men — millions in
temporary accommodation (7) 21 Fish served up in West Indian spicy
paste (6) 24 Flamingo possibly with a scarlet
STEPHANIE LECOCQ/REUTERS
final-day sprint
David Walsh Paris
To borrow from what Malcolm said in Macbeth: Nothing in this Tour de France became it like the leaving of it. The end came on the Champs- Élysées with a sprint that may have been the greatest we have seen on the final day in Paris. The Dutchman Mathieu van der Poel just held on from his Alpecin-Premier Tech team- mate Jasper Philipsen but that is to simplify an utterly engrossing story. Before last year’s Tour, the final stage was a mostly ceremonial race that ended in a tumultuous charge of sprinters to the line. Twelve months ago they changed the route, introduced a circuit in the city that included the Côte de la Butte Montmartre, a tough one-kilometre climb that had to be tackled three times. This was an invitation to riders other than sprinters. See if you can get a gap on the climb, and then try to hold off the pack. Van der Poel and Tadej Pogacar were the two who couldn’t resist yesterday. On the third
de, who has also attracted interest from Real Madrid. Meanwhile, Juventus have made an approach for John Stones, the 32-year- old England centre back who is a free agent after leaving Manchester City. Chelsea have also considered a move for Stones, who played 20 only league matches combined over the past two seasons due to injury. He helped City win six Premier League titles, the Champions League, two FA Cups and five League Cups.
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Check today’s answers by ringing 0905 757 0141 by midnight. Calls cost £1 per minute plus your telephone company’s network access charge. SP: Spoke 0333 202 3390.
The winners of Prize Crossword No 29,598 are M Richardson, Clifford, West Yorkshire JM Bryson, Conwy, Gwynedd B Knott, London W12 R Olswang, London SW14 J Siklos, Harrogate, North Yorkshire
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bronze and the ‘toll’ of the rift with his family
orry guys,” Adam Ramsay-Peaty began, voice cracking, as he stood poolside in Glasgow on Saturday, the bronze medal for the Commonwealth Games men’s 100m breaststroke hanging around his neck. “It’s hard,” he continued through tears, “because I know how hard I’ve worked. I know the shit I’ve been through, which is no fault of my own. It does take a toll.” How did we get here? This is the question anyone with any interest in the three-time Olympic champion’s story was asking, and we’re not talking about his failure to secure gold. That was a disappointment but it was his reaction to the result, the fact that he appeared to blame issues beyond the pool that gave cause for concern. “People who comment and read headlines have got to look themselves in the mirror. Ignoring that comes at a cost,” Ramsay-Peaty said, in case any of us were in any doubt as to what he meant. Those headlines have been coming thick and fast since he got engaged to Holly Ramsay, daughter of the celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay, in 2024. Since then the swimming champion’s life has changed beyond recognition. Now, alongside the intense pressure of trying to maintain his position at the top of his sport, he has become part of a celebrity family living in the public eye. It’s not just that he finds himself among people with money, it’s the exposure, the culture, the rules and expectations that go along with that. The Beckhams — close friends of the Ramsays — have led the way, so we know roughly how it goes even though the families are very different. Partners join the club, play the game and are (unless they’re called Nicola Peltz) grateful to be included. Ramsay- Peaty, you sense, was delighted to have been invited in. Any sportsman competing at his level is, by definition, required to lead a simple ascetic life; now 31, with 20 years of plain living under his belt, he has fallen in love and, at the same time, been ushered into
a sophisticated world of designer clothes and private members’ clubs, brunches and Instagram opportunities, an entire existence of which the young man from Uttoxeter was previously unaware. The trouble is he already had a loving family of his own, the ordinary, unglamorous sort who stay in the background making sacrifices so that their children can do the things they never could and who — if those children are prospective swimming champions — rise at 4am every day in all weather to drive to training sessions (in Ramsay-Peaty’s case, a 40-minute journey from his home in Staffordshire to a swimming club in Derby). Behind every aspiring Olympian there is a parent who has gladly gone the extra distance and every athlete appreciates that sacrifice above all, as he did. There are endless pictures of him grinning, arms around his parents Caroline and Mark — her as often as not with his latest medal around her neck. And then, not long after his engagement, the pictures and the communication suddenly dried up. The first sign of trouble was the rumour that Caroline had not been invited to Holly’s hen do at Soho Farmhouse, when Holly’s mother, Tana, and Victoria Beckham had. Then neither of the Peaty parents were present at the December 2025 wedding and only his sister, Bethany, represented the family. Since then
the story has been steadily going the way of Brooklyn Peltz- Beckham. Caroline is said to have been “banned from the pool” and did not watch her son compete in Glasgow, for the first time in his career. Bethany is allegedly no longer on speaking terms with Holly, and Adam likewise is not talking to his brothers. Meanwhile Adam has just competed under his new married name of Ramsay-Peaty, as if to ram home the message that he is living a new life. The only person watching him win bronze from the stands in Glasgow on Saturday was his pregnant wife. It’s impossible not to compare the Peltz-Beckham estrangement with the Ramsay-Peaty situation. Both rifts are so extreme. Both involve a newlywed young man cutting ties with a family who can’t fathom what they’ve done to deserve it. And both have about them the whiff of wanting to start afresh and erase the inconvenient or mildly embarrassing. In the case of the Ramsay-Peatys it feels like the Peaty family home in Uttoxeter is a very long way from their new £5 million house in Surrey. But this is also why it’s not remotely like the Beckham rift. What makes this far more poignant, apart from their decades of support, is the Peaty parents’ relatively humble situation and expectations. In November 2025, on the night of Adam’s stag do, Caroline was at home looking after his son, George, from a previous relationship. So much for the rumour she wasn’t asked to the hen do: I bet you’ll find she was simply happier in the background, being useful, doing what ordinary mums do. Her disappointment at not seeing her son swim on Saturday will be as nothing compared with her sadness if she is no longer needed when the new baby arrives. Anyone who doubts how sad this estrangement is only needs to take a look at a video posted just before the 2024 Paris Olympics of Adam watching his family wishing him well at the Games. His mum says: “We love you and we just want what makes you happy… When things aren’t going so well you know that you can always come home and I love to see you lying on the sofa, feet over the ends, come and eat some cake or some flapjack.” It’s the feet over the ends that does it.
you any more,’ he said. ‘I haven’t for some time’
a glossy magazine, a devoted partner and a newborn. Then it all changed ‘W
here do you see yourself in five years’ time?” That’s something people ask to gauge what you want out of life. If you’d asked me that in 2021, my answer would bear almost no resemblance to my life today. I’m a single mother of a three-year-old, living in Staffordshire in a house I bought by myself while working as a freelance journalist. To me, our family is small but perfectly formed, even if it’s not a life I would necessarily have chosen for either of us. Five years ago my vision of family life was conventional. I was living with my boyfriend of several years in a one-bedroom flat in south London, peeing on a stick to see when I was ovulating as we navigated the process of conceiving our first child. We had plans to move out of London and buy a home, probably in a commuter county, and I was thinking about reducing my days at work if I could, once our longed-for baby arrived. Marriage further down the line was discussed but, perhaps prophetically, a ring had never actually materialised. I became pregnant in January 2022 and our daughter was born in October. It was a few weeks after this that my boyfriend vanished. Not in the literal sense but the metaphorical one. He was probably last seen in the final days of my pregnancy, though looking back, the telltale signs of him detaching from me were already there during the pregnancy too. The man I thought I would build this cookie-cutter life with no longer existed. To me, to this day, he is a ghost I mourn, though he didn’t die. “I don’t love you any more,” he said one day, almost with relief, when I confronted him about a message that flashed up on his phone that betrayed a flirtation with another woman. “And I haven’t for some time.” In the seconds after his confession I battled conflicting emotions: shock,
revulsion and panic. Our daughter had colic and I was newly diagnosed with postnatal depression. I was not coping. (Was that what made him want to leave, I wondered, then and now?) After the initial wailing, swearing and cursing, the practical side of me kicked in — something I think all mothers can relate to. A survival instinct, for me and my daughter. I begged him to stay, not even necessarily to make it work romantically between us. I just needed someone to help me to get through the next few months of newborn life. At first he said that he would. But within a handful of weeks it was obvious he was simply not there. In a moment of desperation and clarity, I confronted him anew. Perhaps if I forced his hand, he might realise what he stood to lose (he never did). I moved home to the West Midlands to live with my mother before Christmas 2022, telling my friend as we packed up his car, “My life is over now.” To all intents and purposes, that was true. My life as a carefree thirtysomething working full-time at a glossy magazine in London, and living with a devoted boyfriend, was over. I was now a mother, living back at home with a newborn, and with the very real possibility I might never work in magazines again — a career I’d pursued passionately since I was a teenager. The combination of all these things, alongside the colic and the postnatal depression, felt in many ways too much to bear. “I don’t want to do this any more, I can’t,” I said to my mother through tears one day, rocking my daughter to sleep. “You can,” she said. “Because you have to.” The identity crisis that accompanies the first months of motherhood is well known. My body was no longer my own: it was cut open, bleeding, leaking, engorged. It was while feeling like a stranger in my own skin that a new identity I didn’t want was forced upon me — that of the single mother. Someone unwanted and rejected, a victim and a social pariah. I was a
3 times2 SOS! Everything we own was stuck at sea By Katie Strick F
stranger to myself not just physically, but emotionally. Reclaiming the label of “single mum” has been a big part of the past three and a half years. During those first few months, I would shy away from conversations surrounding partners. I felt that to reveal my marital status would be to have a scarlet letter (an S for single rather than A for adulterer) emblazoned on the bosom of all my clothing.
didn’t want was forced upon me: single mother
But once I had opened up to one person and she’d reacted with sympathy, rather than judgment, it became easier. I reconnected with school friends, made new friends among the nursery, swimming and ballet mums, and started to see a future in the Midlands, rather than in London. My daughter’s father came to visit her sporadically, I left my magazine job and started saving for a house. Life moved on. And my single motherhood identity moved on with it. When something traumatic happens to you, it can make you myopic. You
find it difficult to appreciate that you are not special. What happened to me has happened to countless women before and since, and will continue to happen in the future. At the time I was convinced that I was terribly unlucky, that it shouldn’t have happened to me and that this wasn’t something that happened every day. But sadly it is. I don’t know if it’s confirmation bias but it seems every few months there’s another celebrity news story about the same thing: the Wicked actor Ethan Slater leaving his wife postpartum and dating Ariana Grande; the comedian Pete Davidson ending his relationship with his girlfriend five months after their child was born; the actor Barry Keoghan doing the same before his son was one. Today, by and large, I am happy with my life. I love chatting to my daughter about her day, sitting down to dinners together and cuddling on the sofa while we watch a film. She’s growing smarter, funnier and cheekier every day. I see so much of myself in her. It’s a joy to be her mum. Of course, my life in many ways revolves around her, but what mother’s doesn’t? The combination of her being in nursery and my working freelance now means I can do everything I need, or want, to do in a day. I can write, I can exercise, I can keep my house in order, I can do the food shopping and I can get my greys dyed every two months. If I were the
sort of person to get a manicure, I’d be able to do that too. I’ve made it work. I’ve shrunk to fit the life I have — or perhaps I’ve expanded. Sometimes life can feel very small — especially when I work nonstop all day with no downtime, then we both go to bed at 7.30pm — but I imagine that’s the case for a lot of parents, not just those doing it alone. While some of my friends might complain about their husbands not doing enough in terms of childcare, housework or the myriad other ways in which men frustrate women (and vice versa, I’m sure), I’m free of that drama. I’ve tried dating but having another person beholden to me and my time feels too distracting. In many ways it is a lot easier to only have to rely on me. I have to do it so I do, just like my mother told me in those early postpartum days. I’ve often thought about what I will say to my daughter when she is old enough to ask me why her daddy doesn’t live with us and why we don’t see him very often. It’s a question that has kept me up at night on several occasions. All I can think to say is that her mummy and daddy loved each other but he lives in a different city now so we can’t see him very often. It is a version of the truth, after all. In recent weeks I’ve sensed that my daughter does have questions about our set-up. Last weekend we were in a supermarket and she was pointing at the mannequins, saying, “Where is the daddy?” I said, “Maybe there isn’t a daddy.” And she thought for a minute, before replying, “Yeah, maybe he just has a mummy, like me.” She didn’t seem sad about the fact, which is a relief, but I am aware that in the years to come she will have more questions. Some people think that I am too nice to my ex but I know the grief that accompanies being estranged from a parent and I don’t want that for my daughter. In many ways I am still, three and a half years later, begging him to stay. To be a dad. I facilitate this as much as I possibly can. I pick him up from the railway station, organise our activities together, keep things friendly. I know that I would be within my rights to make things a bit harder — make him get an Uber, be awkward about timings, be snarky in person. But it’s just not in my nature. And honestly I just can’t be bothered. There are two sayings I find largely to be true: “kill them with kindness” and “karma is a bitch”. So the universe has everything in hand. It’s very rare that I get upset talking about those dark days in 2022 now. But I often wonder what it would be like to have the life I had envisaged, if the opportunity to travel to a parallel universe were possible. It happens occasionally when I spend time with my ex and our daughter together — something we do from time to time. We will be at a playground or a theme park, laughing together at something she has done, and for a split second I am someone else, somewhere else. But then I snap out of it and realise there are no sliding-doors moments. There is a Japanese art form called kintsugi, which involves repairing broken pottery using lacquered gold. The philosophy is that breakage and repair are part of an object’s unique history and part of its beauty, rather than something to hide. I like to think that this is what I have done in response to what happened to me and my daughter: I have made it into something beautiful.
belongings in a shipping container from Sydney as the Iran war began
heatwave I was rotating the same three T-shirts and two pairs of shorts
or the first four months of living back in the UK, having returned from Australia, my partner and I embraced a new kind of minimalism. When we moved into our new flat in southwest London in April we didn’t kit it out with all the usual lamps, cushions and photo frames. We didn’t pack our wardrobes full of clothes we haven’t worn in years. And we decided not to bother investing in yoga mats or padel rackets — asking to borrow the odd thing would be a good way to get to know our new neighbours, right? Maybe it would be fun, seeing how few possessions we really needed. If there was a semblance of fun to the whole thing, that certainly feels like a long time ago now. Embracing minimalism might be freeing if you’re Marie Kondo. But what if, say, a war has kicked off and sent the shipping industry into chaos, and all your worldly possessions are missing in action, presumed to be floating near the Strait of Hormuz? Our belongings weren’t actually in the strait. But for months they were somewhere in or near the South China Sea, with most global shipping affected by the Iran war. The industry is expected to take months to recover, with analysts warning that disruption could last until the end of the year. We lived in a strange state of domestic emptiness owing to the relocation firm giving us not-very-regular updates. A removal van finally drove up a few weeks ago — nearly five months after we left Sydney, having been told it would take only two. No one had been praying for the heatwaves to end more than my boyfriend, who’s been watching me rotate the same three T-shirts and two pairs of shorts. At first family and friends stepped in, bringing us towels and pillows and kitchenware. My sister kindly lent me her bike for a few weeks and my parents drove up with a boot-full of belongings I haven’t seen since my mid-twenties. It sounds romantic, that notion of rallying together — until your sister wants her bike back. And what about the things you can’t borrow? My partner had to fork out £1,000 on new suits and shirts as the day of going back to work approached. We ended up having to throw more money at the problem after an email told us our shipping had only made it as far as Singapore. When the removal van showed up I considered turning it away, thinking about having to unpack duplicates of everything we’d just bought, until I remembered I liked the idea of wearing a different dress to a wedding that weekend. Living with less only feels liberating when it’s a choice — otherwise it’s just expensive. Moving countries in the next few months? Leave room in your suitcase for some work clothes and a few dresses for weddings. For sanity’s sake, it’s probably worth hiding an AirTag in there too.
4 Monday July 27 2026 | the times times2 I’m 39, a fit and healthy Ibiza DJ. Here’s why I had an Alzheimer’s test
T
A blood test to gauge the risk of developing dementia is available. After seeing her father die of the illness, Jules Cameron tells Anna Maxted why she signed up
he week of her father’s 80th birthday (“he has no idea, of course”) the DJ and presenter Jules Cameron posted a joyful video on Instagram of the pair of them dancing to the Blues Brothers’ Everybody Needs Somebody to Love. Her dad has rhythm. She captioned it, “Alzheimer’s can take memories but not music or his moves.” Last February — six months later, and a decade after his diagnosis — he died. Since then, Cameron, 39, has become so anxious about developing the disease herself that she has just taken a pioneering blood test that helps to gauge risk. Available from Goodbody Clinics across the UK, the Alzheimer’s blood test, LucentAD pTau217 — developed by a US health company — is simple, quick and non-invasive. The test costs £479 in clinic and £499 for a home visit from a phlebotomist — though Cameron’s was complimentary. The test (already used in routine clinical care in America) assesses levels of the biological marker pTau217, elevated amounts of which are strongly associated with Alzheimer’s pathology. It’s designed to support clinical assessment by a healthcare professional if there are concerns about cognition or memory, rather than replace a full medical diagnosis. Evidence suggests that blood tests targeting pTau217 are as accurate as amyloid PET scans and lumbar punctures, and may revolutionise Alzheimer’s diagnosis by offering a fast, less invasive and more accessible alternative. It’s why a similar blood test targeting pTau217 is undergoing clinical trials in a study led by UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology, with 1,100 participants recruited from 20 NHS memory clinics, to demonstrate that the test is accurate, cost-effective and suitable for integration into routine care across NHS memory services. When Cameron and I meet in a north London café to discuss her father, I say I’m sorry for her loss. She deflects her grief over his Alzheimer’s with dark humour. “It was a long time, though — ten years — so by the end
you’re like, ‘Get on with it!’” In truth, it devastated her. She describes her father’s illness as “one of my life’s greatest tragedies”, and vividly paints the particular horrors of his decline. There was the time her brother dropped off their dad to meet her at a London railway station and he wasn’t where he was supposed to be. Cameron ran around, sobbing, saying, “Help me, has anyone seen this man?” Forty-five minutes later, she found him. “He was stood in a corner, didn’t know why he was there. It was awful.” The heartbreak of it. “He didn’t think to look at his phone. I don’t think he would have known how to open it.” Until Jules was ten, her father, Ewen, was an army man (Lieutenant Colonel Cameron, MBE). “He was cavalry. He led the Queen’s birthday parade, trooping the colour,” Cameron says with pride. He loved attending reunions, preparing by writing elusive names on cards, but as the embarrassment of forgetting them crushed his confidence, he stopped going. He’d married late, in his early forties, and by the time Cameron was an adult, becoming interested in her parents as people, “he was starting to go downhill”. She says: “One of the saddest things for me is I felt I never got to know my dad that well.” Yet they had they forged “a close, energetic connection”. There was “a
real love there”. In the earlier stages of his disease Cameron took her father travelling, to Thailand and Dubai. When she visited her parents, in Northern Ireland, she quickly learnt to go along with everything he said. “Dad always used to think that people he saw on telly were his mates in real life.” The TV and radio presenter Rylan Clark was the big favourite — and after Cameron posted about it, Rylan sent a video message: “Ewen, it’s your mate Rylan… we’ll grab a beer!” These, of course, are the showreel highlights, Cameron says. As her father’s disease progressed, hastened by other health issues and retirement from a busy job in the finance sector, “You’d get asked the same question ten times in two minutes.” She doesn’t sugarcoat the pain of it. Alongside her post about the dancing, she wrote: “Despite it looking all fun and games Dad has deteriorated a lot lately. Getting him to do tasks like having a shower or brushing his teeth is met with a lot of resistance. He can get very angry when we try to help him. He is particularly snappy with my mum, who is his full time carer. Dad’s Alzheimer’s has taken a huge toll on her the last ten years. She says the only time she has any joy is when we come over.” His death, in a hospice, was “quite peaceful”, Cameron says. But when she recalls events like running around a railway station crying, terrified that her father had wandered off, you sense the trauma of it stirring up. Since he died, she has posted amusingly about grief (“girl who makes everything a sign from her dead dad” — robins, shells, rocks). She’s also Jules Cameron taking the blood test at home in London
I watched someone I love slowly disappear, while still being here
shared her lifestyle changes — such as fasting, drinking less alcohol, prioritising sleep as much as she can, given her career, exercising more — to protect her brain health. “I think about [Alzheimer’s] more than I’d like to admit. I’m terrified of getting it.” Her father was fit when in the army, but after leaving it for a more sedentary career, “he was just a workaholic, in the office, drinking loads of coffee, eating loads of sugar”. She adds: “I watched someone I love slowly disappear, while still being here. And that stays with you.” Yet taking an Alzheimer’s blood test feels like a bold, brave move. “I am already very anxious about getting it anyway,” Cameron says, disarmingly frank. At one point, recalling how her dad “would get really angry because he couldn’t find words for things”, she adds, not entirely joking, “I feel that I’m like that.” Because she has ADHD, “I’m extremely forgetful as it is. I already struggle with my cognitive function.” (Important note: a systematic review published in 2024 in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease concluded, “ADHD may be a risk factor for certain neurocognitive disorders, although the evidence base is limited, and the absolute risk is small.”) She’s aware that chronic lack of sleep can be detrimental and contribute to the amyloid plaque build-up in the brain associated with Alzheimer’s. “In my twenties I never slept, I was always out partying, and now I’m a DJ later in life. I’ve got a gig next Friday in Ibiza and I’m DJing from midnight till six in the morning.” Plus, she says, “I never switch off, ever.” But the main driver of her anxiety is “because I went through it with my dad. I’m hyper-conscious of it,” she says. “So every day, when I’m losing things or forgetting things or can’t find
a word, I immediately think, ‘Oh God, it’s probably Alzheimer’s.’ I thought I might as well know.” She received her results by email ten days after the blood test — and it’s good news. “They said it’s very unlikely because my markers are low.” Cameron forwards me the report, which notes that, “LucentAD pTau217 helps identify whether a patient with cognitive or memory concerns is likely or unlikely to have amyloid plaques in the brain, a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease.” The result is given as the concentration of pTau217 in the sample, in picograms per millilitre (pg/ ml), representing a low (0.040 pg/ml or less), intermediate (0.041-0.089 pg/ ml), or high (0.090 pg/ml or more) likelihood of amyloid pathology. Cameron’s result is 0.016 pg/ml. An accompanying letter confirms, “There is no evidence from this test to suggest a significant likelihood of amyloid plaque accumulation,” though it’s stressed that it’s only one component of a broader clinical assessment and should be interpreted by your medical professional “alongside your symptoms, medical history, cognitive assessment and any other relevant investigations”. “It’s a relief to hear I don’t have high levels,” she says. “It’s just amazing that this test gives people the opportunity to detect signs of it really early.” According to Alzheimer’s Research UK, 22 per cent of people experience more than a two-year wait on the NHS to get diagnosed after they’ve been to their GP about symptoms. Cameron says she’ll never fully have peace of mind. “Because on a daily basis I notice my cognitive function being tricky, it’s hard to be ‘oh I’m fine’.” But, she concedes — and it’s gratifying to hear after all she’s endured — “it has given me some relief”. goodbodyclinic.com
£54k family inheritance online
social media posts about courses to be a ‘founder’. I had no idea where it was leading S
itting in our kitchen, my husband and I listened with furrowed brows as his brother detailed the collapse of his marriage. They weren’t compatible any more — it was like walking on eggshells. We nodded sympathetically. And then a muffled sentence. Some words I couldn’t quite catch, and as I leant forward in my chair my husband leapt from his. “She spent £54,000!” he shrieked as I snorted wine through my nose. “On what? A castle in Scotland? A trip to the moon?” My brother-in-law looked down at the table as he whispered, “Business courses”. My hand rose to my mouth as if I were witnessing a car crash in slow motion, baffled by the brazen audacity and utter betrayal of it all. My husband’s brother met his wife when she was on holiday in England. In a meet-cute fitting for a Richard Curtis film she took a tour, he was her guide — it was fate. What could go wrong? She was from Sweden but they made it work. She flew to him, he flew to her, until eventually she moved to England and they got married in 2019. According to my brother-in-law she had worked at a Stockholm bank for 18 months several years ago, and he therefore considered her to be as fiscally adept as a Goldman Sachs executive. When she arrived in London she found a job as an accountant for a restaurant chain, providing a valuable second income to bolster my brother-in-law’s. While he’s hardly skint, he earns, at best, £20,000 a year, supplemented by what he makes from renting out a holiday cottage that he inherited from his father. He was able to buy a house outright for £500,000 using money passed on to him from his mother, the rest of which he has put away as a form of pension. He gets by frugally, with a nest egg for later life, but a second income was needed to cover the expenses of two people. In late 2019 my husband’s grandfather died, leaving him and his brother another lump sum. Both were advised to pass part of the money to their wives for tax reasons, to put away in Isas and savings accounts. It wasn’t “ours” to do with as we wished — it was to fund our shared futures with our husbands. A few months later my sister-in-law quit her job and Covid hit shortly after. It was then that strange videos started. She posted them as Instagram stories, unveiling a new business
deliver jumbled life advice to her 200 followers
account that she had set up, Life Coaching for Founders. Given that she wasn’t a life coach and had never founded anything, it made for a bewildering combination, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. As I scrolled through the videos I became entranced. I watched video after video begin and end without any point being made. She talked in circles about “the power of the mind”, made several references to Steve Jobs in the present tense and spoke in jazzy word salads sprinkled with Instagram platitudes. It quickly became my favourite show on the internet. Friends and family were tuning in with me, popcorn at the ready, trying to see if we could make heads or tails of what she was trying to say. The videos were unsolvable riddles and we’d scratch our heads trying to piece together the message. She set up a studio in her office where she’d talk into the abyss for hours about her love of being a founder, delivering jumbled life advice to her 200 followers. To accompany the social media she made a website that looked as if it was from 1998. It had clip art graphics and vague mission statements splashed across an aesthetically startling backdrop of yellow and purple. Sometimes product prices were listed, other times they were shrouded in mystery; trying to get the monetary value of an hour of one-to-one time with her was baffling. She made some online courses and those usually had a purchase option, but they were often listed for an obscenely high and bizarrely specific price, such as £3,847.93 for 30 days of “guidance”. She attended conventions and workshops — “How to Sell Courses Online”, “Intro to Digital Marketing”, “Grow Your Audience, Now!” — and she’d post them all on Instagram as proof of her life as an “entrepreneur”. Perplexed by her behaviour, I googled one of the courses and discovered that it cost an eye-watering £5,000. She even left a review: “It hasn’t worked for me yet, but I know that it will!” As this unfolded, my husband and I were in a state of confusion. Surely she needed to work? This couldn’t be making any money? Who was paying for these courses? But we concluded
that there must be a piece to the puzzle that we simply didn’t have. Now, in the kitchen, we realised that we hadn’t missed anything — his brother had. Of course he’d been frustrated that she hadn’t earned money for six years but he had trusted her drive. And yes, he’d known about a few courses, but how much could they cost? He thought she was good with money— she’d worked at a bank for 18 months, after all. Somehow he thought the interest from the money he had given her was covering these expenses. Little did he know that she had been sucked into an online vortex and struck down by a modern affliction that plagues millions: the belief that we can all be entrepreneurs, regardless of skill or ability. In the age of Instagram bizfluencers, all you apparently need is hard work, perseverance, their course (and someone else’s money). She’d become akin to a gambling addict, throwing good money after bad. As each course failed to improve her business, she moved on to the next, believing that that course was her path to millions — without asking anyone around her if her business plan, rambling ideologies or bizarre website made any sense before she spent £54,000 on them. My brother-in-law found out about her financial infidelity when he asked for the money back to pay off the mortgage on his rental cottage. She went quiet before whispering that it was “gone”. He stood motionless, struck by horror, his world crashing around him as he tried to count all the lies she’d told that had led to this. After years of counselling and trying to keep their marriage afloat, that was the nail in the coffin. Divorce proceedings followed swiftly and she agreed to deduct the money she’d spent from her settlement, although she remained unapologetic, believing it all to have been a worthwhile investment. Later, when I asked my brother-in-law what her plans were post-divorce, he responded earnestly, without a whiff of sarcasm, “She’s going back to university.” I assume the settlement’s covering that. The writer has chosen to remain anonymous
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Monday July 27 2026 | the times life Ask Professor Tanya Byron My work with traumatised children has left me emotionally exhausted and hypervigilant
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I have worked with vulnerable and abused children for nearly 14 years, most of whom have experienced violence, severe abuse, neglect and exploitation. I love my job and still believe passionately in what we do, but I am worried about what it is doing to me. The children tell me things that most people could never imagine. I carry images and stories home that I wish I could forget. I don’t talk about the details with my husband because I don’t want to burden him, but I have become more anxious and more suspicious of people. If my teenage daughter is even only ten minutes late home, my mind jumps to the worst scenarios. I sleep badly and sometimes wake after vivid dreams about children I have worked with. I am losing my resilience and have become emotionally exhausted, but I still care deeply. I feel self-indulgent writing this because none of these terrible things happened to me. We all used to have regular supervision but, owing to increasing demands, that happens less often. I don’t want to leave the profession but I also don’t want to become someone who sees the world only through the lens of trauma. Yasmin
Working with traumatised children is unlike almost any other profession. Every day you are asked to listen to experiences most people don’t want to think about: sexual abuse, physical violence, emotional cruelty, neglect, exploitation. You do so not as a detached observer but by entering the child’s world to understand what happened, to help them begin to process it and safeguard them. It is emotionally and cognitively demanding work: you are constantly holding risk, making complex
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decisions and regulating your emotional responses while helping a child regulate theirs. That has consequences. What you describe is not a failure of resilience. You are suffering with vicarious trauma, which is the psychological consequence of prolonged exposure to trauma, occurring in professionals who repeatedly witness its detailed reality. Research highlights that this can lead to a transformation in the practitioner’s internal world, where beliefs shift around safety, trust, control and human nature. Some professionals develop symptoms that closely resemble post- traumatic stress disorder despite no direct exposure to the traumatic event. Known as secondary traumatic stress, it’s whereby intrusive images, nightmares, physiological arousal and avoidance become frequent. Your statement that you “still care deeply” indicates that you are not suffering from compassion fatigue but that your capacity to process the emotional impact of that compassion is becoming overloaded. There is a limit to how much terror, grief and cruelty any nervous system can absorb before it recalibrates its expectations of the world. One of the paradoxes of trauma work is that professionals often become skilled at helping everyone except themselves. You help children to transform overwhelming trauma into coherent narratives that their brain can store as something that happened rather than something that still feels as though it is happening. Trauma professionals need exactly the same opportunity. Some experiences are too emotionally powerful to process alone, and thinking only becomes possible when another mind helps us to make sense of the trauma — this is psychological containment. You contain the children and young people you protect and support, and therefore it is
If you would like Professor Tanya Byron’s help, email proftanyabyron@ thetimes.co.uk
imperative that you receive the same: high-quality reflective supervision is an essential clinical safeguard. Rather than trying to emotionally distance, the goal is emotional flexibility: being able to contain another person’s suffering and then deliberately step back from it. Many trauma clinicians develop small transition rituals at the end of the day, for example, a walk before getting into the car, listening to a playlist when driving home or spending a few minutes focusing on breathing. These provide repeated signals to the brain that the period of threat monitoring has ended and it is safe to return to ordinary life. The same principle applies when you notice your mind catastrophising. If your daughter is late home, take some breaths (the out breath is always longer than the in breath) and recognise them as the response of a nervous system that has spent years protecting vulnerable children. Then be curious: how many times has your daughter been delayed? What evidence do you have that something terrible has happened? This is not about suppressing anxiety but helping the thinking part of the brain come back online. Finally, there is another concept that receives far less attention than vicarious trauma: vicarious resilience. Professionals are changed not only by witnessing cruelty but also by witnessing extraordinary courage, survival and recovery. The children you work with are not defined solely by what happened to them. Many of the children and young people I have worked with over the years have shown astonishing determination and hope despite experiences that would decimate most adults. I am still in contact with some more than two decades after I worked with them, and
celebrate their lives and the relationships and families they build. I hold on to those stories not because I’m being naively optimistic but so that my picture of humanity remains accurate rather than distorted by the bias of our work. The responsibility for managing vicarious trauma does not rest solely with individual professionals but equally with organisations that ask people to undertake emotionally hazardous work. Just as we should never repeatedly expose someone to physical danger without appropriate protection, we should not repeatedly expose professionals to psychological trauma without cultures in which acknowledging emotional impact is regarded as evidence of professionalism rather than weakness. Sadly, this is often not the reality in services stretched to breaking point. Prioritise high-quality reflective supervision or personal therapy so your difficult cases can be thought about not simply carried. There may be employee assistance schemes available. Also talk to your GP. Sleep is vital as this is when the brain processes emotional memories. Develop calm night-time and sleep routines and use mindfulness, relaxation and exercise to settle your nervous system. Notice when your threat system follows you home: if you find yourself catastrophising, gently acknowledge that your brain has become highly sensitised through years of safeguarding work, then deliberately bring your attention back to the evidence in front of you. Finally, rebalance the picture of humanity your work creates. Spend time with people who make you feel safe, seek out experiences of kindness, humour and family life, and remember the children who recovered, laughed and flourished, not only those who suffered. The aim is to restore perspective, allowing your compassion to remain sustainable rather than becoming overwhelming. I wish you well.
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weight (just don’t ask what it cost)
Brian Woulfe took up a new hobby, he didn’t realise he’d lose 13kg and blow the bank, says Katrina Burroughs
Brian Woulfe
veryone who hasn’t seen me for the last six months, the most common question I get is: am I on Ozempic?” says the interior designer Brian Woulfe, who has lost 13kg this year. “It infuriates me when people make that assumption. I’ve gone to all of this effort to do this myself.” Woulfe, 43 and now 66kg, took up polo last year, transforming his physique — and his life. “I would describe polo as my midlife crisis,” he says. “Some people go and buy sports cars or have affairs and I decided to buy horses.” For 17 years he had been building up his multi-award-winning studio, Designed by Woulfe. “Work has been my life. It has dictated holidays. It has dictated what I do socially. It was seven days a week, no boundaries.” He adds: “I never felt I was overweight or I was incredibly unhealthy, but equally I realised I wasn’t ripped and beach-ready, and certainly didn’t have the body I had in my twenties and early thirties.” So what does a fortysomething time-poor founder-director do when he needs a pastime that will help him to unwind and get him looking great in Speedos? Woulfe grew up on a farm on the west coast of Ireland and had ridden from an early age and done some showjumping, so when friends suggested an equestrian pursuit, even though he hadn’t ridden for 25 years, it made more sense than golf. When he took up the new sport the notion of dipping into a hobby was soon forgotten. He has gone on to captain his own team, House of Woulfe, and won tournaments and cups, including the Candilio Cup and Spring Amateur Tournament. “I’m as driven with my polo pony as I have been with my career. I’m a grafter. I think when I do something I want to do it to the best of my abilities,” he says. He did his first season (a polo season typically runs from May to September) with Menard Polo in 2025, under an Argentinian pro called Antonino Menard. This year he moved to Guards Polo Club in Windsor Great Park. The world’s most prestigious polo club, Guards is where King Charles played competitively; he is
the same as friends sending their kids to private school
now club president. Remember that famous photo of Diana wearing her black sheep sweater? It was taken at a Guards polo match. Prince Harry has played at Guards and Prince William has captained teams for the Royal Charity Polo Cup there. It’s a magnet for A-listers and aristos. Other famous polophiles associated with Guards include Jodie Kidd, who played for England, and Eddie Redmayne, who went to Eton with William. Hayley Atwell and Luca Pasqualino, who starred in the Disney+ Jilly Cooper hit Rivals (Atwell plays Helen, the ex-wife of Rupert Campbell-Black, and Pasqualino plays Bas Baddingham), were spotted at the Cartier Queen’s Cup last month. So is polo all partying and serial adultery à la Cooper? “Not for me. I gave up drinking for six months this year,” Woulfe says. “There are a lot of very attractive people in the sport, particularly the Argentinians, who
seem to be very popular with both the men and the women. So I would imagine that there are a fair few saucy moments going on in and around the polo fields. But I couldn’t possibly comment.” Woulfe himself has a blissful set-up: he lives between London and an impeccably renovated old vicarage in Oxfordshire with his partner, Milan Lenart, and dogs, Barney and Porter. They have four pygmy goats, Nibbles, Noodles, Bramble and Biscuit, and an assortment of chickens, guinea fowl and peahens. Apart from keeping his eye on the ball, he must be concerned with his bank balance. He won’t name a cost but says: “I’ve made peace with the fact that I’m spending the same budget as friends sending their kids to private school and taking them on holidays.” A little pricier than Ozempic, then. He lists a few bills an aspiring
player might factor in. “You can lease a pony for £1,800 a month for the season or you can buy a polo pony for £5,000. You can buy a great polo pony for £30,000 but you can buy an amazing polo pony for six figures.” He decided to buy, and owns Sexy Bebe, Garua and Charrua, but will rent extras when required. Then you need a human team. “I have a polo pro who’s a constant on my teams. And then I have a polo manager who looks after my ponies. He arranges the teams for me. He arranges for the ponies to get to the games. He makes sure that they have seen the vet, that they’ve seen the farrier, that they’re exercised every day, that their tack is all OK. He has a spreadsheet for everything, which works very well with my personality.” If the costs are high, so are the benefits. Polo fit is a whole different level of fit. “When I started I had the flexibility of a garden chair. I couldn’t touch my toes. I’m doing weight training three times a week. I do spin most Saturdays and Sundays for my cardio. I do reformer Pilates for my core. And then I’m playing polo three, maybe four times a week on top of that. I feel five, if not ten years younger than I did last year.” He continues: “My body is completely different, from my grip strength, my core strength, the strength in my thighs, my lower back, my shoulders. I carry myself differently. I am a lot more upright. I can now touch the floor.” But back to those thighs — are strong thighs the key to polo excellence? “Yes, they are. You have to be able to grip and hold yourself in a half seat position. You don’t sit down; you’re constantly gripping with your inner thighs and you’re sitting out of the saddle.” His health and fitness are undoubtedly maxxed, but the work/life balance is still out of kilter. Now he is arriving in the office at 5am so he can leave early for practice. “My partner jokes that he is a polo widow. The horses currently get more attention than he does,” Woulfe says. “He would say that my physical appearance now is better than it was when I met him.” Woulfe’s physical transformation has been accompanied by an entirely new wardrobe, like a Nineties rom-com geek-to-chic makeover. “My collar size has gone down two sizes, so I’ve had to get new dress shirts and new blazers. And I’ve had all my trousers taken in. And now I’m obsessed with extra-small T-shirts. There’s a boutique at Guards Polo Club called La Martina. Lovely Becky, who works at La Martina, has a good old laugh at my expense. Most polo players wear tops that are slightly more baggy and they have more movement in them when they’re playing polo. Whereas I’m like, ‘No, no, no — smaller, smaller, smaller.’ I need to see my arms. I haven’t worked this hard to have it all hidden.”
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David Byrne to the rescue
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otherwise bland festival, says Stephen Dalton
Latitude 2026 Henham Park, Suffolk {{{((
elebrating its 20th anniversary over the weekend, Latitude took place in heatwave temperatures, even if the musical line-up felt unusually lukewarm. Launched in 2006, the Suffolk festival has always been pitched at older, more moneyed revellers with less interest in cutting- edge music than in the wider menu of comedy, theatre and upmarket food stalls. Among the bespoke birthday markers scattered across Henham Park’s idyllic woodland site this year was a flock of sheep with dyed red coats — a living artwork by Ami Cadillac — and a dazzling aerial drone display that painted colourful tableaux across the night sky before spelling out Latitude’s name. Friday night belonged to the headliner David Byrne, a coup given how much of a hot ticket the 74-year-old avant-pop icon’s live spectacular has become. Indeed, this writer gave the tour’s European debut a five-star review in February. Slightly tweaked from its indoor iteration, this open-air version felt a little underpowered in places, but Byrne’s audiovisual arty-party extravaganza remains hugely ambitious, inventive and joyous. Inevitably, Talking Heads classics including Psycho Killer, Once in a Lifetime and Burning Down
Royal Northern Sinfonia Glasshouse, Gateshead {{{((
the House earned the loudest reactions, the crowd becoming a huge sing-along choir. After peaking early with Byrne, the weekend became a dispiriting procession of bland busker-level talents, cruise-ship crooners and easy- listening nostalgia acts. In fairness, Latitude has always been a musically mellow festival, but this year’s line-up felt particularly low on edgy, fresh or leftfield artists. And while Saturday’s main stage headliner Teddy Swims brought plenty of impassioned testifying and big-band swagger, his brand of jukebox Americana ultimately felt like a safe, calculated exercise in retro rock’n’soul pastiche. At least the second stage threw up a few pleasingly wonky choices, including the young Mancunian quartet Westside Cowboy, who punctuated their alluringly ragged indie-rock with melodious country- folk vocal harmonies. The Scottish eccentrics the Beta Band also played a likeable hour of ramshackle stoner grooves, while Wet Leg proved reliable crowd-pleasers with their revved-up punk-pop clatter and saucy lyrics. On the comedy stage, Lenny Henry performed a slimmed-down version of his comeback tour Still at Large. Audience affection for Henry was palpable even if his genial musings on middle age, fame and family earned more polite giggles than belly laughs. That said, his observations on the festival’s overwhelming whiteness were acute, while his spot-on imitations of personal heroes
ne of the most likeable things about the Proms’ annual foray into the northeast of England is that it isn’t just a festival in the region; it’s very much of the region too. This year that included three venues (Gateshead, Sunderland and Middlesbrough) and a collection of performers from the northeast, including jazz from Knats, orchestral performances from the Royal Northern Sinfonia, and two local choirs, the RNS Chorus and Voices of the River’s Edge, singing alongside the BBC Singers, all conducted by Sofi Jeannin in her final performance as the BBC Singers’ principal conductor. Accompanied only by a freewheeling, rhapsodic saxophone solo from Jess Gillam, they sounded terrific in the vast concourse of Gateshead’s Glasshouse, voices and sax blending and expanding into the huge acoustic with semi-mystical beauty. Unfortunately, the same setting didn’t work so well for another northeast star, Nadine Shah, who performed on the concourse alongside the RNS on Friday evening. Unlike the choirs, Shah’s set had amplification, which boomed around the vast acoustic of the Norman Foster-designed space in a way that
David Byrne’s inventive and joyous set was a Latitude highlight
Nadine Shah was magnetic on stage
took the edge off the sound. Shah is a magnetic stage presence, and her vibrant, expressive voice still managed to cut through with passionate intensity, even when the words were lost in the echo, with emotions lying raw on the surface, be that in the dark anger of Fool, the political energy of Out the Way or the reflective tribute to
including James Brown and Tommy Cooper were winningly warm-hearted. Like Latitude itself, this was an anodyne show, agreeably laidback but low on bite.
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her late mother in Prayer Mat. The players from the RNS had precious little to do alongside her, however. They sprinkled a little colour in the twinkle of All I Want and the fake twee of Holiday Destination, but they rarely added much to the bite of the original songs. In the climactic energy of Greatest Dancer they might as well have been spectators. The oddest, most adventurous thing in the weekend happened in the Glasshouse’s smaller auditorium, where three musicians from the RNS gave the first Proms performance of Morton Feldman’s Crippled Symmetry. Feldman constructs his piece from repeated fragments and gives the performers no indication of when or whether they should play together so that the three lines of music drift in and out of alignment throughout the work’s 90-minute span. Maybe it’s revolutionary or maybe it’s Feldman playing an extended prank on the audience. Still, you had to salute the commitment of Helena Gourd (flute), Jude Carlton (percussion) and Dinis Sousa (keyboards) as they twinkled, hovered and levitated through a piece that’s often as frustrating as it is transfixing. Simon Thompson On BBC Sounds
Sinfonia of London/ Wilson Royal Albert Hall, London {{{{{
ome Proms blow you away, leaving you delirious in the sonic whirlwind. I admit I had reservations about John Wilson’s decision to conduct all three of Ottorino Respighi’s massive orchestral depictions of Rome — Festivals, Fountains and Pines — in one hour-long sequence, even with 120 superstar players from his Sinfonia of London available to infuse cinematic vividness into these kaleidoscopic soundscapes. After all, who can deal with three giant plates of pasta, with all the rich trimmings, in quick succession? In the event, no indigestion — just wonderment at the sheer daring of Respighi’s ultra-romantic and sometimes cacophonous orchestrations, outdoing Rimsky-Korsakov and Strauss. And also his masterly way of evoking everything from a nightingale singing on Janiculum Hill (in fairness, the composer specifies using a recording of a real bird) and mythological nymphs splashing through Bernini’s Triton Fountain, to the Christians chanting a defiant (if shamelessly anachronistic) Gregorian hymn as they face Nero’s lions, and the spectacular vision of a battle-scarred imperial army marching triumphantly home. By the time we reached that Via Appia finale I was convinced that the music couldn’t get any louder or more bombastic. But then a legion of extra brass players suddenly appeared high above the orchestra, and briefly it seemed that even the mighty organ might be drowned. It wasn’t, of course. Wilson should really have gone for the full Charlton Heston look and conducted this gigantic splurge in tunic and sandals, with a sword swirling round his head. But personal flamboyance is not his style. Indeed, one incongruous but fascinating aspect of this conductor is that he achieves deft miracles of flexibility, precision and virtuosity without waving his arms around like a latter-day Leonard Bernstein. He gives his hand-picked players exactly what they need, nothing in excess, and they respond with magical moments, start to finish. It’s invidious to pick out one such solo, but the offstage trumpet in the catacomb movement of Pines, played from the gallery, was transfixing. Before all that, what a contrast. William Walton wrote his Cello Concerto in the 1950s while living in Italy, but there the link with Respighi ends. The concerto is the quintessence of English melancholia, wistfulness, regret and understatement, occasionally seared by flashes of orchestral anger. Jonathan Aasgaard played it without exaggeration or histrionics, but with revelatory subtlety and wonderful technique, especially in the cadenza-like passages where the fragmented phrases of the unaccompanied cello hang in the air like fragile silver threads. Remarkably, after the concerto, Aasgaard then led the cello section for the Respighi. He clearly didn’t want to miss the fun. Richard Morrison On BBC Sounds and iPlayer
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Gandhi — Philip Glass and me
that he made a show about it. By Richard Morrison
two-hour monologue about a man trying to put together a show with a famous composer doesn’t sound terribly gripping. But when Phelim McDermott premiered his Tao of Glass at the Manchester International Festival seven years ago, audiences and critics were enchanted. “An exploration of the mystery of artistic creation that’s both marvellously entertaining and deeply touching,” I wrote in The Times. Since then McDermott, 62, who cofounded the theatre company Improbable 30 years ago, has performed Tao of Glass around the world. Now it’s in the West End. A good moment, then, for McDermott to explain, in his inimitably digressive style, how and why he devised the show. It all starts with the “Glass” in the title. That refers to Philip Glass, the 89-year-old American composer who actually appeared in the Manchester premiere (his age now makes air travel difficult). McDermott has staged several of Glass’s operas in London and New York, but his connection
with the composer’s music goes back to his student days. “I did a BA in performing arts at what was then Middlesex Poly,” he says. “In my last year we made a show called Cupboard Man, based on an Ian McEwan story, and we used music from Philip Glass’s album Glassworks. Well, we took it to the Edinburgh Fringe, where Pierre Audi saw it and brought it to the Almeida. So my first professional performance in London was connected to Philip’s music.” That was in 1985, the same year that English National Opera gave the UK premiere of Glass’s Akhnaten. The young McDermott went to see it. “It was the old David Freeman production, the one with loads of sand,” he says. “Funnily enough, years later when I was directing [Glass’s] Satyagraha at the ENO they said: ‘You’re not going to use sand, are you? It took us 15 years to get rid of it all from under the stage.’” That 2007 production of Satyagraha, Glass’s opera on the life of Gandhi, was McDermott’s first direct encounter with the composer. The wonderfully whimsical staging has been revived many times. “Actually when I was first approached by ENO they said: ‘Do you want to do Glass’s
career something happens when something else falls apart
Einstein on the Beach?’” he recalls. “I said, ‘No way. You can’t stage that. It’s too extraordinary, like a kind of strange fever dream.’ But John Berry at ENO said: ‘At least go to New York and meet Philip Glass.’ Of course I said yes. “So I knocked on Glass’s door in downtown Manhattan and the first thing he said was, ‘Why do you want to do Einstein on the Beach?’ I said, ‘I don’t!’ Well, we talked for an hour in a local café, and at the end of it he said: ‘Your genuine reluctance to do Einstein on the Beach really makes me think you should do it.’ Which was such a Philip Glass thing to say.” The paradox is that, 20 years later, McDermott is finally going to stage the epic Einstein for ENO in Manchester next year. He’s looking forward to the challenge. “It’s like when you read that book by Stephen Hawking,” he says, meaning A Brief History of Time. “For about 15 minutes you go, ‘I think I’ve got it!’ Then your understanding fades like a dream. When people go to Einstein on the Beach I want them to feel, maybe only for a day, that they understand what relativity is, what quantum entanglement is, what a gravitational field feels like.” But it’s still five hours long, isn’t it? “Yes,” McDermott says, “but when we staged Akhnaten we had people coming up afterwards and saying: ‘I wanted it to go on longer.’” And as McDermott learnt when he staged Satyagraha, the one thing Glass demands is that his operas aren’t cut. “Philip said: ‘I don’t care what you do with it, but you must do all of it.’ I think because there was a famous instance of the opera being cut by 20 minutes on a CD version. The producers obviously thought, it’s Glass, it’s the same music over and over, nobody will notice if we cut it. Even when we took Satyagraha to the Met in New York, Peter Gelb [the Met’s boss] came to me and said: ‘Can’t you make it a bit shorter?’ I guess because of overtime payments. I said: ‘No, Peter, that was literally the only thing that Philip insisted on.’ So we did it complete.”
The style of theatre that McDermott has developed at Improbable — making shows through improvisation — has proved perfect for maintaining visual in Glass’s long stretches of repetitive chordal sequences. “We have always improvised with materials and puppets,” McDermott says, “although in the old days people would say: ‘Don’t put the word “puppets” on the poster, people will never come.’ And with Philip’s work there’s all this space to fill. You look at a scene and go: ‘Oh my God, it’s 18 minutes, how do we fill it?’ But then you go into the rehearsal room and start mucking around, sticking old newspapers together or whatever, and soon you’re saying: ‘Damn, it’s only 18 minutes, how are we going to fit all these ideas in?’” Tao of Glass starts with an account of how Glass and McDermott attempted to make a show out of a Maurice Sendak children’s book — a project that collapsed before it started. “It’s like much of my career,” McDermott says. “Something happens when something else falls apart. I told Philip I had this dream of doing a show where it’s just him and me in a room, and we create this show about my obsessions: the theatre and his music. He said, ‘Will there be puppets in it?’ I replied, ‘Of course.’ He said, ‘Well, I have no idea what it is, but we seem to be making a show together.’” “That’s how it began. We had this crazy week where I would recite stories and he would sit at a bashed-up old piano and improvise. At the end we had about a dozen pieces of music and he went away and orchestrated them for a small band.” What’s the meaning of “Tao” in the show’s title? “It’s the belief that there is a process in life, in nature, and it communicates with you,” McDermott says. “Sometimes you feel you are pushing against that. So if something is not happening the way you planned, you have to ask: what’s trying to happen here, what’s trying to emerge? Tao is really about inviting into your life the emergent unfolding process.” So it’s basically about going with the flow, rather than fighting it? “It’s about being in tune with those deep energies, learning to listen to them,” McDermott says. “When I was a child my mum used to take me to see all those wonderful actors at the Royal Shakespeare Company. I thought, one day I’ll be here directing Shakespeare. Well, that didn’t happen. I ended up directing at the RSC, but it was a Japanese anime adaptation [My Neighbour Totoro]. So I think the Tao listens to what your dreams are, but then makes them turn out not quite as you thought they would be.”
Philip Glass and Phelim McDermott. Left: Tao of Glass
10 Monday July 27 2026 | the times times2 Your weekday brain boost
puzzles to give your brain an extended workout Samurai easy
SAMURAI
Fill each grid so that every column, every row and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 to 9. Where the puzzles overlap, the rows and columns do not go beyond their usual length.
SAKURO
Place the numbers 1 to 9 in the spaces so that the number in each circle is equal to the sum of the four surrounding spaces, and each colour total is correct
Sudoku
SUDOKU
MINI SUDOKU
Fill in the grid so that every column, every row and every 3x2 box contains the digits 1 to 6
Play Mini Sudoku every day Monday-Sunday online at thetimes.com and on Live app
CODEWORD
Every letter in the crossword-style grid, right, is represented by a number from 1 to 26. Each letter of the alphabet appears in the grid at least once. Use the letters already provided to work out the identity of further letters. Enter letters in the main grid and the smaller reference grid until all 26 letters of the alphabet have been accounted for. Proper nouns are excluded.
KILLER
Fill the grid so that every column, every row and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 to 9. Each set of cells joined by dotted lines must add up to the target number in its top-left corner. Within each set of cells joined by dotted lines, a digit cannot be repeated.
TRAIN TRACKS
Lay tracks to enable the train to travel from village A to village B. The numbers indicate how many sections of track go in each row and column. There are only straight sections and curved sections. The track cannot cross itself.
Futoshiki Fill the blank squares so that every row and column contains each of the numbers 1 to 5 once only. The symbols between the squares indicate whether a number is larger (>) or smaller (<) than the number next to it.
FUTOSHIKI
puzzles
Pages 14-16
I
Carol Midgley TV review
The Rapture BBC1 {{{{(
n Greek mythology Cassandra was a Trojan priestess who could accurately predict the future but was cursed that nobody believed her. In The Rapture Bethany the teenager seems to be in a similar bind, but with the added bummer that she is in a secure psychiatric unit in south Wales for killing her mother by stabbing a screwdriver through her eye, so is not best placed to be taken seriously. India Amarteifio is impressive as Bethany, managing to combine the sneering superciliousness of an apparent matricidal psychopath with the haunted vulnerability of a
How Did We Get Here?:
No World Order
Radio 4, 9.30am
Tristan Redman examines the post-Cold War world order in which liberal democracy and a financial system underwritten by American power — referred to as the rules- based international order — was king. Now things are changing, and Redman, above, is joined by Lindsey Hilsum, the international editor of Channel 4 News, and Allan Little, a former BBC correspondent, to look back at the decade after the Cold War in which the question of foreign intervention was repeatedly tested in events including the Rwandan genocide and the Srebrenica massacre during the Bosnian War. Clair Woodward
possessed 17-year-old who appears to be receiving messages from the earth and knows things will happen before they do. She is able to draw these events on a sheet of A4, foreseeing terrible things coming (ie “the Rapture”). How is the drama going to explain all that? It’ll be worth watching just for this denouement. The beating heart of the series is Bethany’s jousting relationship with her psychologist, Dr Gabs Fox (Ruth Madeley), who has enough on her plate, what with being paralysed from the waist down after a car accident in which her husband was killed. The duelling between patient and psychologist is a tired TV device now but the dialogue in these scenes is sharply written. The series is at its best when the two are locked in mental combat, Bethany doing her best to taunt her doctor with cruel jibes. “I knew you had a car crash. I didn’t know you were a cripple,” she says, sneeringly, at their first meeting, where she gives Gabs the nickname “Wheels”. Eyeing her wheelchair, she asks why Gabs still bothers to wear make-up when “no one is going to look at you like that ever again”. Isn’t it interesting how psychopaths basically behave like the nastiest trolls online? It’s also interesting that television so often borrows details from The Silence of the Lambs. Bethany stealthily slips a ballpoint into her pocket (she’s not
Times Radio Digital, web, smart speaker, app
5.00am Tom Nunan with Early Breakfast 6.00 Rosie Wright and Calum Macdonald with Breakfast 10.00 Lara Spirit 1.00pm Mark Urban 2.00 Jane Garvey and Fi Glover 4.00 John Pienaar 7.00 The Evening Edition with Kait Borsay 10.00 Carole Walker 1.00am The Best of Times Radio
Radio 2 FM: 88-90.2 MHz 6.30am Sara Cox 9.30 Vernon Kay 12.00 Jeremy Vine 2.00pm DJ Spoony 4.00 Angela Scanlon 7.00 Jo Whiley 9.00 The Blues Show with Cerys Matthews 10.00 The Good Groove with Melvin Odoom 12.00 OJ Borg 2.30am One Hit Wonders 3.00 Dance Sounds of the 90s (r) 4.00 Owain Wyn Evans
Radio 3 FM: 90.2-92.4 MHz 6.30am Breakfast 9.30 Essential Classics 1.00pm Classical Live Linton Stephens presents another chance to hear part of last Friday’s Prom by the Sinfonia of London, with John Wilson conducting the orchestra in Respighi’s colourful Roman triptych. BBC Proms — Hildegard of Bingen (Symphony of the Harmony of Heavenly Revelations, — Alleluia, O virga mediatrix). BBC Proms — Respighi (Roman Festivals). Pau Casals International Music Festival — Bach (Cello Suite No 1 in G, BWV 1007). BBC Proms — Respighi (Fountains of Rome); Aldeburgh Festival — Rachmaninov (Preludes, Op 32). BBC Proms — Poulenc (Sinfonietta) and BBC Proms — Respighi (Pines of Rome)
Ruth Madeley plays the psychologist Dr Gabrielle Fox
4.00 Composer of the Week:
Alice Mary Smith (1839-1884)
Donald Macleod explores the life
and music of the composer
5.00 In Tune
7.00 Live BBC Proms 2026
Hannah French presents from the
Royal Albert Hall as Edward
Gardner conducts the London
Philharmonic Orchestra and the
soprano Louise Alder in Tjøgersen,
Canteloube and Richard Strauss.
Kristine Tjøgersen (Between Trees
— UK premiere); Canteloube
(Songs of the Auvergne —
La pastoura als camps; La
delaïssádo; Deux bourrées; and
Baïlèro); and Richard Strauss
(An Alpine Symphony)
10.00 Night Tracks
11.30 ’Round Midnight
Highlights from the Jazzahead
trade fair and festival
12.30am Through the Night (r)
Radio 4
FM: 92.4-94.6 MHz
5.00am News Summary
5.04 Last Word (r)
5.34 Shipping Forecast
5.43 Prayer for the Day
5.45 Farming Today
6.00 Today
9.00 Across the Red Line
Common ground in an increasingly
polarised world (1/3)
9.30 Choice How Did We
Get Here?: No World Order
The Ƽrst decade after the
end of the Cold War (1/6)
10.00 Woman’s Hour
11.00 Church Going,
with Giles Fraser
Giles returns to a parish where he
served as a young priest (3/3)
11.45 Confessions of
a Performative Male
Darren McGarvey asks tough
questions about masculinity (1/5)
12.04pm You and Yours
1.00 The World at One
1.45 Dead Rabbit
A sinister discovery in the
British countryside (6/10)
2.00 The Archers (r)
2.15 Alone
By Moray Hunter (3/6) (r)
2.45 Opening Lines (r)
3.00 A Good Read
Lauren Child and David McAlmont
discuss their favourite books (8/9)
3.30 You’re Dead to Me
A light-hearted look at
Tutankhamun’s parents (5/13) (r)
4.00 Troubled Town
Anti-social behaviour among
young people around Wigan (r)
4.30 The Kitchen Cabinet (4/7) (r)
5.00 PM
6.00 Six O’Clock News
6.30 Just a Minute
With Tony Hawks, Desiree Burch,
Cariad Lloyd and Julian Clary (2/6)
7.00 The Archers
Fallon has concerns
7.15 Front Row
8.00 The BrieƼng Room
David Aaronovitch hosts the Ƽrst
of two shows on immigration (r)
8.30 BBC Inside Science
The latest scientiƼc research (r)
9.00 Across the Red Line
Common ground (1/3) (r)
9.30 How Did We Get Here?:
No World Order (1/6) (r)
10.00 The World Tonight
10.45 Wild Dark Shore
Rowan persuades Fen to take her
to the boat wreckage (6/10)
11.00 Intimacy
Drama, with Lena Headey, about
an intimacy coordinator (1/4)
11.30 A Good Read (2/9) (r)
12.00 News and Weather
12.30am Confessions of
a Performative Male (1/5) (r)
12.48 Shipping Forecast
1.00 As BBC World Service
Radio 4 Extra Digital only 8.00am Dr Phil’s Bedside Manner 8.30 Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital 8.45 Small Island 9.00 Just a Minute 9.30 The Time of My Life 9.45 Daily Service 10.00 Sounds Natural 10.30 Boy Racers 11.00 Raƿes 11.30 High Table, Lower Orders 12.00 Control Group Six 12.30pm Dad’s Army 1.00 Dr Phil’s Bedside Manner 1.30 Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital 1.45 Small Island 2.00 Wordaholics 2.30 A Whole ’Nother Story 3.00 Gertrude Stein and the Liberation Fruitcake 3.45 The Phoenix and the Carpet 4.00 Sounds Natural 4.30 Boy Racers 5.00 Raƿes 5.30 High Table, Lower Orders 6.00 Control Group Six 6.30 Dad’s Army 7.00 Dr Phil’s Bedside Manner 7.30 Sounds Like London: 100 Years of Black Music in the Capital 7.45 Small Island 8.00 Wordaholics 8.30 A Whole ’Nother Story 9.00 Gertrude Stein and the Liberation Fruitcake 9.45 The Phoenix and the Carpet 10.00 Comedy Club: Just a Minute 10.30 Listen Against 11.00 Current-ish 11.30 The Museum of Everything
Radio 5 Live
MW: 693, 909
5.00am Wake Up to Money 6.00
Breakfast 9.00 Nicky Campbell
11.00 Adrian Chiles 2.00pm Matt
Chorley 4.00 Drive 7.00 Glasgow
2026. The Commonwealth
Games 10.00 Sarah Mulkerrins
1.00am Dotun Adebayo
allowed sharp objects), echoing Lecter stealing a pen and using the metal clip to unpick the lock on his handcuffs, subsequently spreading carnage. Happily, this hasn’t happened thus far in The Rapture. The physical practicalities of managing Gabs’s disability are not glossed over. We see her urinating and also testing out a vibrator, which she hurls across the room in frustration, leaving it quivering on the floor. “I can’t imagine anyone but Alex ever touching me, or if I’d feel it if they did,” she tells her therapist (Ruth Jones). That Gabs’s fledgling romantic interest is Frasier Melville doesn’t bode well, mainly because he is played by Jack Farthing, who usually turns out to be a baddie. Also emanating bad vibes is Bethany’s father, Leonard Krall (Sam Hazeldine). He is giving “cult leader” and apparent climate-change denier with his happy-clappy vainglorious speeches to his church flock, who wear “Choose hope” T-shirts. Gabs says such T-shirts are “my litmus test for twats”. Good line. Anyway Bethany, who was convicted after drawing a picture of her mother with a screwdriver through her eye days before it happened, says she is innocent. We’ll see. My question is, if she could foresee her mother being killed, why couldn’t she also see who did it?
10.00 Jim White and Simon Jordan 1.00pm Hawksbee and Jacobs 4.00 talkSPORT Drive 7.00 Kick Off 10.00 The Sports Bar 1.00am Extra Time with Paul Ross
Talk
Digital only
6.00am Jeremy Kyle 10.00
Julia Hartley Brewer 1.00pm Ian
Collins 4.00 Kevin O’Sullivan 7.00
Peter Cardwell 10.00 Petrie
Hosken 1.00am Paul Ross
6 Music Digital only 5.00am Amy Lamé 7.00 Nick Grimshaw 10.00 Jamz Supernova 1.00pm Deb Grant 4.00 Steve Lamacq’s Teatime Session 7.00 New Music Fix Daily 9.00 Riley & Coe 11.00 The First Time With 12.00 Skunk Anansie at the BBC 2.00am Skunk Anansie Live 3.00 Midnight Meets with Colin Murray 4.00 The Skunk Anansie Playlist
Virgin Radio Digital only 6.30am Steve Denyer on The Chris Evans Breakfast Show 10.00 Ana Matronic 2.00pm Ben Jones 6.00 Geoff Lloyd 10.00 Goldierocks 2.00am James Merritt
Classic FM
FM: 100-102 MHz
6.30am Breakfast with Dan Walker
9.00 The Hall of Fame Hour with
Dan Walker 10.00 Aled Jones
1.00pm Anne-Marie Minhall 4.00
Margherita Taylor 7.00 Relaxing
Evenings with Zeb Soanes
9.00 Classic FM’s Composer
Carousel With Zeb Soanes
10.00 Calm Classics 1.00am Bill
Overton 4.00 Early Breakfast
PICKS OF THE DAY
Evolution
BBC2, 9pm
In the third episode of his riveting series about the evolution of five animals, Chris Packham wonders: how did the bat get so hungry? It’s another high-stakes game of survival as Packham guides us through the astonishing origins of the animal’s guts and jaws, and its mind-boggling echolocation skills — the ability to “see” via sounds
BBC1
BBC2
ITV1
Channel 4
5
6.00am Breakfast
9.30 Animal Park (r) (AD)
10.15 Trace, Track, Get My Car Back (r)
10.45 Expert Witness (r)
11.15 Homes Under the Hammer (r) (AD)
12.15pm Bargain Hunt
1.00 BBC News at One; Weather
1.35 BBC Regional News; Weather
1.45 BBC News at One; Weather
2.00 Money for Nothing. New series.
A blacksmith faces his biggest ever
challenge in a set of theatre lighting stands
2.45 Escape to the Country. Jules Hudson
heads to the Cumbrian countryside with a
sporty couple chasing a fresh start (r)
3.45 The Bidding Room. One of Scotland’s
most famous Ƽgures comes to light
4.30 The Travelling Auctioneers.
A Glasgow decluttering throws up valuable
jewellery and ice skates (r) (AD)
5.15 Pointless. Quiz show (r)
6.00 BBC News at Six; Weather
6.30 BBC Regional News; Weather
7.00 The One Show Samantha Morton, Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould guest
7.30 EastEnders Ian prepares for what could be his Ƽnal day of freedom, while George is confronted by someone from his past (AD)
8.00 Panorama Current affairs report
8.30 Scam Interceptors Fraudsters try to fool a woman into buying them a top-of-the-range mobile phone (r)
9.00 The Rapture Gabs tracks down the mystery woman in Bethany’s drawings. A viral article shakes her trust in Dick, as she makes a shocking discovery. A widespread blackout causes chaos (2/5) (AD)
10.00 BBC News at Ten
10.30 BBC Regional News and Weather 10.40 Who Do You Think You Are? Toby Jones explores an extraordinary acting dynasty on his mum’s side and is determined to discover whether his dad’s stories of a connection to India are fact or Ƽction (5/8) (r) (AD)
11.40 FILM: The Lady in the Van (12, 2015) The true story of writer Alan Bennett’s friendship with an eccentric homeless woman, whom he befriended in the 1970s before allowing her to park her dilapidated van outside his Camden home. Comedy drama starring Maggie Smith and Alex Jennings (AD)
bouncing off nearby objects. Marrying slick graphics with scientific expertise, the viewing experience is enhanced by the presenter’s joy in the natural world, epitomised by his celebration of Luca, the last universal common ancestor. This is a tiny cellular life form that somehow survived intensely inhospitable conditions during our planet’s infancy and which is the source of everything, connecting us all: big small, furry and, well, batty. Ben Dowell
6.30am Bargain Hunt (r)
7.15 Animal Park (r)
8.00 Sign Zone: The Repair Shop (r) (AD, SL)
9.00 BBC News
1.00pm Richard Osman’s House of Games.
With Yasmine Akram and Cariad Lloyd (r)
1.30 The Finish Line. Quiz contest (r)
2.15 Lightning. Quiz hosted by Zoe Lyons (r)
2.45 The Hairy Bikers’ Bakeation. Seeking
out the best baking in Norway (r) (AD)
3.45 The Farmers’ Country Showdown. A pig
farmer and a sheep farmer compete at
Edenbridge & Oxted Agricultural Show (r)
4.15 Earth from Space. Following an
elephant family during a drought (r) (AD)
5.15 Flog It! From Gloucester Cathedral (r)
6.00 Richard Osman’s House of Games.
Karen Hauer, Storm Huntley, Joe Marler
and Tom Read Wilson take part (r)
6.30 Just One Thing. Clive Myrie heads to
Kent, where he meets a woman and
suggests to her that borrowing a pet might
lower her blood pressure (r) (AD)
7.00 Global Eye Investigations from BBC correspondents all over the world
7.30 Mastermind Specialist subjects are the band Madness, geologist James Hutton, the Ƽlms of Wes Anderson, and the history of the Paris Metro
8.00 Only Connect Victoria Coren Mitchell hosts as the Sinistrals take on the Merseyside Eyes in the Ƽrst round
8.30 University Challenge University
College, Oxford takes on
St John’s College, Cambridge
9.00 Evolution Chris Packham looks at
the evolution of the bat, looking at
how the drive to Ƽnd food shaped life
on Earth and gave rise to one of
nature’s most insatiable feeders.
See picks of the day (3/5) (AD)
10.00 Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing Bob and Paul head to the Lake District (3/6) (r) (AD)
10.30 Newsnight Insights and global interviews with Victoria Derbyshire
11.05 FILM: Hope and Glory (15, 1987)
Life in London during the Blitz from
the viewpoint of a boy who sees the
war as an adventure. John Boorman’s
semi-autobiographical drama
starring Sebastian Rice-Edwards and
Sarah Miles. See Ƽlm choice (AD)
12.55am Sign Zone: CountryƼle Anita Rani
visits a nature reserve on the Essex coast (r)
(SL) 1.50 Bergerac. Modern re-imagining of
the crime drama starring Damien Molony
(1/6) (r) (AD, SL) 2.35-2.45 Lifeline. Eddie
Marsan presents this appeal on behalf
of Tourettes Action (r) (AD, SL)
Drawing on archive footage, photos and contributions from historians, this sets out to “reveal the role” of ghettos in the Holocaust. After the German invasion, Poland’s Jews were forcibly removed to slum districts that were overcrowded “open-air prisons”; instead of murdering them, the Nazis counted on starvation and disease reducing numbers. With Hitler and Stalin at war from mid-1941, Evolution, BBC2, 9pm
6.00am Good Morning Britain
10.00 This Morning
1.30pm ITV News; Weather
2.00 Dickinson’s Real Deal. The team heads
to Telford, where Alison Chapman decides
diamonds are her best friend and Stewart
Hoffgartner puts down the big bucks for
an adventurous pocket watch (r) (AD)
3.00 Deal or No Deal. Stephen Mulhern
hosts as a contestant tries to open the 22
red boxes in the right order, taking on the
infamous Banker for the chance to win a
life-changing cash prize (r) (AD)
4.00 Tipping Point. Ben Shephard hosts the
arcade-themed quiz in which contestants
drop tokens down a choice of four chutes in
the hope of winning a £10,000 jackpot (r)
5.00 The Chase. Bradley Walsh presents as
contestants from ChesterƼeld, Altrincham,
Southend-on-Sea and Gloucester pit their
wits against one of the ruthless Chasers (r)
6.00 Regional News; Weather
6.30 ITV News; Weather
7.30 Fletchers’ Family Farm The family have a night away camping in their own woodland (7/10) (r) (AD)
8.00 Emmerdale Kev is keen to make a good impression, while Steve has plans up at Home Farm (AD)
8.30 Coronation Street Jodie’s unexpected arrival overshadows Harper’s welcome-home party (AD)
9.00 The Dark Monica tries to put her family’s safety Ƽrst, but races into action when the killer’s identity is discovered and she has the chance to save his Ƽnal victim (6/6) (AD)
10.00 ITV News at Ten; Weather;
followed by Regional News
10.45 TikTok: Murder Gone Viral A look
at the case of American inƽuencer
Alexis Sharkey, who was declared
missing in November 2020 by her
husband and whose body was
found shortly after (3/3) (r) (AD)
11.40 Love & Death A sense of normality returns after Candy is forced to take stock of her marriage (3/7) (r) (AD)
12.40am Shop on TV 3.00 The Staircase. Police investigate when a businesswoman is found dead after reportedly falling down a ƽight of stairs. Fact-based drama starring Colin Firth and Toni Collette (r) (AD, SL) 4.05 Unwind with ITV 5.10-6.00 Dickinson’s Real Deal. In Peterborough (r) (AD, SL)
The Ghettos and the Holocaust
PBS America, 9.50pm
6.25am Cheers (r) 7.45 Everybody Loves Raymond (r) (AD) 9.10 Frasier (r) (AD) 11.10 Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares USA (r) 12.05pm Channel 4 News Summary 12.10 Find It, Fix It, Flog It (r) (AD) 1.10 The Great House Giveaway. Two strangers in Neath buy a property (r) 2.10 Countdown. With Scarlett Moffatt 3.00 A Place in the Sun. Jasmine Harman goes house-hunting in southern Spain (r) 4.00 Narrow Escapes. In Derbyshire, a pair head through the Bosley Locks on the MacclesƼeld Canal, en route to the Caldon Canal anniversary festival (r) (AD) 5.00 Château DIY. Owners battle sub-zero temperatures as they try to transform a wing of a derelict château with no running water or electricity into a habitable space (r) (AD) 6.00 American Pickers. When they uncover one of the rarest motorcycles in the world, Mike Wolfe and Frank Fritz try to muster more cash than ever to seal the deal (r) (AD)
7.00 Channel 4 News
8.00 Dover 24/7: Britain’s Busiest Port
Storm Amy heads to Dover where
high winds blow a cruise ship
off-course. Border Force discover
a vehicle whose tyres have been
stuffed with contraband (AD)
9.00 24 Hours in A&E At Queen’s Medical Centre in Nottingham, a 23-year-old woman has had a riding accident, falling off her horse which then rolled on top of her, while doctors urgently need to determine if a 26-year-old man is having a stroke (AD)
10.00 Secret Lives of Gypsy Wives Tina is heartbroken by an unaffordable vet bill. Trewley still plans a Hallowe’en party and her inƽuencer career gets a boost. Trewley is inspired to bring her mum and her sisters into a photo shoot. See picks of the day (AD)
11.05 999: On the Front Line Paramedics Ƽnd a woman who has fallen, is on blood thinners and may have a bleed on the brain. A man is Ƽnding it hard to communicate and his face is drooped on the right-hand side (r)
12.05am Secrets of the Celebrity Sex
Tapes (AD) 12.55 The Showjumper Murder
(r) (AD, SL) 2.45 FILM: Pooja, Sir (15, 2024)
Crime thriller starring Asha Magrati. In
Nepali, Hindi and Maithili 4.30 Sunday
Brunch (r) 4.35 Hollyoaks Omnibus (r)
(AD, SL) 5.45-6.25 Countdown (r)
more ghettos were opened in German-occupied Soviet territory; and by late 1942 all were integrated into the “final solution”, serving as holding pens before deportation to the death camps. Recently exhumed diaries are used to illuminate aspects of ghetto life, from the acute moral dilemmas faced by community leaders to the emergence of children (more easily able to smuggle goods or make illicit purchases) as breadwinners. John Dugdale
6.00am Milkshake!
9.15 Jeremy Vine
11.30 Storm & Alexis
12.45pm 5 News at Lunchtime
12.50 Matt Allwright
2.20 FILM: She Is Not Your Daughter
(12, TVM, 2022) When Kathy’s family is
threatened, she discovers that her husband
has kept a chilling secret from her for years.
Thriller starring Alicia Leigh Willis (AD)
4.00 Castle. The author is knocked out
during a case and wakes up in a world in
which he has never met Beckett, and has to
try to Ƽnd a way back to his own reality (r)
4.55 Love Nature. A look at the migration of
Barnacle geese at WWT Caerlaverock (r)
5.00 5 News with Dan Walker
6.00 Jersey and Guernsey. On Jersey, a
sailing duo take part in the historic Gorey
Regatta, but as the race gets underway, they
soon Ƽnd themselves on course for
a collision. Last in the series (r)
6.55 5 News Update
7.00 Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders Near Scunthorpe, PCs are on the tail of a possible cloned BMW, but the driver attempts a getaway, making a run for it across a Ƽeld after hitting a dead end (3/10) (r)
7.55 5 News Update
8.00 Street Cops: Catching the Yobs New
series. Return of the documentary
following Northamptonshire police,
with an emergency distress call from
an oƾcer seeing all units race
to protect their colleague
9.00 The Crow Girl A body buried in
woodland leads Jeanette to the
dysfunctional Burkeman family, while
the death of one of her clients leaves
Sophia Ƽxating on her sessions with
Victoria, and an encounter with Amar
brings Mike closer to the truth.
Stars Eve Myles (4/6) (AD)
10.05 Commonwealth Games 2026
Highlights from the fourth day in
Glasgow, which included swimming
and para swimming, weightlifting
and the Ƽrst medal events in
athletics and para athletics
11.05 Police: Night Shift 999 A PC is on patrol on the M5 when he spots a man driving while watching something on his phone, and pulls the driver over. An oƾcer is called to a local park when a member of the public complains about a man injecting himself with drugs (8/8) (r)
12.05am Traƾc Cops (r) 1.00 Cruise TV
with LoveitBookit (r) 2.00 Murder Scene: The
Incident Room (r) 2.50 Jersey and Guernsey.
Last in series (r) 3.45 Friends (r) (AD) 4.35
The Highland Vet (r) (SL) 5.25 Entertainment
News on 5 5.35 Milo (r) (SL) 5.45-6.00
The Adventures of Paddington (r) (SL)
House of the Dragon
Sky Atlantic/Now, 9pm
Although HBO is keeping shtoom about what happens in episode six, online speculation points to a battle in which the greens take on the blacks’ army under Daemon (Matt Smith). Otherwise we can be fairly confident that Ormund (James Norton) will be silkily scheming again, that Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) will continue to find being queen is not all it’s cracked up to be, and that Alicent (Olivia Cooke) and
7.00pm Atlantic: The Wildest Ocean
on Earth. Dolphin pods and penguin
colonies in the South Atlantic (AD)
8.00 Treasures of Ancient Greece.
Western civilisation’s love affair with
Greek art. Last in the series (AD)
9.00 Egypt’s Lost Cities. The
potential existence of buildings
beneath the sands of Egypt (AD)
10.30 Becoming Frida Kahlo. The
documentary charts Frida’s time in
San Francisco with Diego Riera,
where her style caused excitement
and she became determined to
succeed in her own right (AD)
11.30 The Secret Life of the Mona
Lisa. The mystery of Leonardo
Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa (AD)
12.30am Atlantic: The Wildest
Ocean on Earth. Documentary
(AD) 1.30 Treasures of Ancient
Greece (AD) 2.30am-3.30 The
Secret Life of the Mona Lisa (AD)
U&Drama
7.00pm The Catch Up
7.05 Deadly 60. Steve Backshall
visits the rainforests of Brazil
7.30 Deadly 60. The creatures
that pose a threat to humans
8.00 The Great British Sewing Bee.
Sophie Willan welcomes 12
contestants into the sewing room,
with Patrick Grant and Esme Young
setting three challenges on the
theme of the British summer (AD)
9.00 The Great British Sewing Bee.
Three challenges themed around
prints and colours (AD)
10.00 FILM: La La Land (12, 2016)
Musical starring Emma Stone
and Ryan Gosling (AD)
11.55 Things You Should Have Done
12.20am Things You Should Have
Done 1.15 BBC New Comedy
Awards 2024 1.45am-3.45
Small Town, Big Riot (SL)
Variations
BBC1 N Ireland 8.30pm-9.00 Barra’s Return of the Wild 10.40 True North: Punchline — Fighting for Laughs (r) 11.10 Who Do You Think You Are? (r) 12.10am FILM: The Lady in the Van (2015) 1.50am-6.00 BBC News
BBC1 Scotland 11.40pm Scotcast (r) 12.10am FILM: The Lady in the Van (2015) 1.50am-6.00 BBC News
BBC1 Wales 8.30pm-9.00 Our Lives: Stone Strong. The tradition of stone lifting
Live
BBC2 N Ireland 10.00pm-10.30 Kayak ó Thuaidh (r)
Corlys (Steve Toussaint) will spend the entire episode being grumpy. JD
Secret Lives of Gypsy Wives
Channel 4, 10pm
The TikTok star Trewley-Precious, aged 26 and living in a bright pink chalet in the garden of her mum’s home, tonight recalls being raised on her Clacton council estate in Essex. “When I was growing up,” she says, “it was hectic. Like, there was gangs, there was stabbings.” In this episode her influencer career
Sky Arts 6.00am Academy of Ancient Music: Vivaldi’s Four Seasons 7.25 The Joy of Painting (AD) 9.00 Tales of the Unexpected (AD) 10.00 Alfred Hitchcock Presents 11.00 Discovering: Gregory Peck (AD) 12.00 The Movies (AD) 1.00pm Tales of the Unexpected (AD) 2.00 The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (b/w) 3.00 The Seventies (AD) 4.00 Discovering: Claudia Cardinale (AD) 5.00 Portrait Artist of the Year 2021. Sitters include Kelly Macdonald (AD) 6.00 Tales of the Unexpected (AD) 7.00 Alfred Hitchcock Presents 8.00 André Rieu: Songs from My Heart. A midsummer’s night concert 10.30 Jean-Michel Jarre Live in Sevilla. A 2025 concert 12.30am Making a Maestro 3.30 Inside Art: Derek Jarman at Manchester Art Gallery 4.00 The Art of the Garden 5.00am-6.00 The Movies (AD)
6.00am Backyard Builds (SL) 6.30
Deal or No Deal (AD) 7.30 Dress to
Impress (AD, SL) 8.25 Olivia and
Alex: Parenthood (AD) 9.30 The
Only Way Is Essex 10.30 The Real
Housewives of Salt Lake City 11.20
The Real Housewives of Orange
County 12.15pm Dinner Date (AD)
1.15 Supermarket Sweep 2.15 The
Floor USA (AD) 3.10 The Only Way
Is Essex 4.10 The Real Housewives
of Salt Lake City 5.00 The Real
Housewives of Orange County
6.00 Celebrity Catchphrase (AD)
7.00 The Floor USA (AD)
8.00 The 1% Club (AD)
9.00 Love Island. Live finale
10.20 Family Guy (AD)
11.20 American Dad! (AD)
12.20am Bob’s Burgers (AD)
1.15 Plebs (AD, SL) 1.40am-2.35
Deal or No Deal (AD, SL)
BBC Scotland 2.00pm This Farming Life (r) 3.00 Beechgrove Garden (r) 3.30-4.30 Paramedics on Scene (r) 7.00 News 7.30 The Great Food Guys (r) 8.00 The Mountain (r) 9.00 Interior Design Masters with Alan Carr (r) 10.00 River City 10.30 Two Doors Down (r) 11.00 Scotcast 11.30- 12.00 Mrs Brown’s Boys (r)
S4C
6.00am Cyw 12.00 News; Weather
12.05pm Ffasiwn Drefn (r) 12.30
Heno (r) 1.00 Straeon Harri Parri
(r) 2.00 News; Weather 2.05
Prynhawn Da 3.00 News; Weather
3.05 Ras Yr Wyddfa (r) 4.00 Awr
Fawr 5.00 Stwnsh 6.00 Rhys
Patchell: Japan a’r Gic Olaf (r) 6.30
Eigra (r) 6.59 News 7.00 Heno
7.30 News; Weather 8.00 Gemau’r
Gymanwlad 2026 10.28 Y Tywydd
10.30-11.35pm Ar Brawf (r)
gets a boost from an eyelash collaboration. Helen Stewart
STREAMING CHOICE
Furious
Disney+
In this cat-and-mouse thriller Catherine (Lola Petticrew), a serial killer and loner, is investigated by Alice (Emmy Rossum), an FBI agent lent support by her old friends Marshall (Jake Lacy) and Danny (Scoot McNairy). These women —
8.55am Heir Hunters 10.00 Four in
a Bed 12.40pm Come Dine with Me
(AD) 3.20 Four in a Bed 5.50 George
Clarke’s Old House, New Home (AD)
6.55 Location, Location, Location
7.55 Grand Designs. Kevin McCloud
follows a project to transform an
ineƾcient and uninspiring 1950s
house into a sleek, modernist
masterpiece (7/12) (AD)
9.00 Bill Bailey’s Vietnam. Bill
arrives in the mountains
surrounding Sa Pa (AD)
10.00 24 Hours in A&E. A young
man has a severe reaction to
a recreational drug (AD)
11.05 24 Hours in A&E.
A 75-year-old man is treated for a
stab wound to the neck (AD)
12.10am 999: On the Front Line.
A man in cardiac arrest in the street
1.15 24 Hours in A&E (AD)
3.25am-3.55 A Place in the Sun
6.00am George and Mildred 7.05
Classic Emmerdale (AD) 8.05
Classic Coronation Street (AD) 9.10
A Touch of Frost (AD) 11.20
Heartbeat (AD) 1.30pm Midsomer
Murders (AD) 3.35 Classic
Emmerdale (AD) 4.40 Classic
Coronation Street (AD) 5.50
Heartbeat. Rural drama (AD)
8.00 Midsomer Murders. A country
magazine and its outspoken owner
come under scrutiny from Barnaby
and Jones when a body is
discovered in woodland (AD)
10.00 Grantchester. No one can
verify Geordie’s whereabouts when
a suspect is found dead (5/6) (AD)
11.00 Grantchester. Sidney’s
old friend Reverend Sam Milburn
goes missing (6/6) (AD)
11.50 Trial & Retribution (2/2)
1.25am-2.25 Wycliffe
8.00am America the Bountiful 8.35 Treasures Decoded 9.35 Pirates: Behind the Legends 10.35 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed 11.50 The Ghettos & The Holocaust 1.00pm America the Bountiful 1.35 Treasures Decoded 2.35 Pirates: Behind the Legends 3.35 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed 4.55 The Ghettos & The Holocaust 6.05 America the Bountiful 6.40 Treasures Decoded 7.40 Pirates: Behind the Legends 8.35 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed. Investigating what Dark Age Britain was really like 9.50 The Ghettos & The Holocaust. The role ghettos played in the Holocaust. See picks of the day 11.00 Pirates: Behind the Legends 12.00 King Arthur’s Britain: The Truth Unearthed 1.15am-2.00 America the Bountiful
polar opposites, ostensibly — are played by markedly different performers: Rossum a singer-actress best known for the US version of Shameless; Petticrew the intense lead in two recent Troubles dramas, Say Nothing and Trespasses. JD
FILM CHOICE
Hope and Glory (15, 1987)
BBC2, 11.05pm
John Boorman’s wartime drama is a loosely autobiographical take on life
sport
today
Live Shanghai Masters Snooker TNT Sports 1, 7am-10.30 Coverage from the first round on the first day of the tournament, at Luwan Indoor Stadium in Shanghai, China
The Hundred: Southern Brave Women v MI London Women Sky Sports Cricket, 2.45pm-6, Sky Sports Main Event, 3pm-6 (Start-time 3.00). Coverage of the match from Utilita Bowl
Live Tennis Sky Sports +, 4pm-4am, Sky Sports Tennis, 4pm-2am Coverage of day one of the Washington DC Open
The Hundred: Southern Brave Men v MI London Men Sky Sports Main Event, Sky Sports Cricket, 6pm-9.30 (Start-time 6.30). Coverage of the match from Utilita Bowl
Live MLB: Texas Rangers
v Seattle Mariners
TNT Sports 1, 7.30pm-10.30
(Start-time 7.35). Coverage of
the American League match
from Globe Life Field
6.00am Fish Town (r) 8.00 Billions
(r) (AD) 10.10 The White Lotus (r)
(AD) 12.25pm Homicide: Life on the
Street (r) 2.15 Billions (r) (AD) 4.25
The White Lotus (r) (AD)
6.45 The Gilded Age. Agnes and
Ada are concerned about Peggy’s
worsening condition (2/8) (r) (AD)
7.55 The Gilded Age. Negotiations
start to disintegrate (3/8) (r) (AD)
9.00 House of the Dragon. Game of
Thrones prequel starring Matt
Smith. See picks of the day (r)
10.20 The Last of Us. Ellie
encounters a vengeful group
of survivors (8/9) (r) (AD)
11.25 Dune: Prophecy. Sci-fi prequel
starring Emily Watson (r) (AD)
12.45am The White Lotus (r) (AD)
2.00 Gomorrah: The Origins.
New series. Crime drama prequel
starring Luca Lubrano. In Italian
4.10am-6.00 Urban Secrets (r)
6.30am FILM: Account Rendered (PG, 1957) (b/w) 7.45 FILM: The Breaking Point (U, 1961) (b/w) 8.55 FILM: Do You Know This Voice? (PG, 1964) (b/w) 10.30 Z Cars 11.30 Star Performance: The Deceiving Eye (b/w) 12.00 Railway Murders 1.00pm Richard the Lionheart (b/w) 1.30 FILM: The Spaniard’s Curse (U, 1958) (b/w) 3.00 Look at Life 3.15 FILM: Assignment K (U, 1968) 5.10 Cinebox Memories 5.15 FILM: The Arsenal Stadium Mystery (U, 1939) Thriller starring Leslie Banks (b/w) 7.00 The Footage Detectives 8.00 Maigret. A murder in a family 9.50 FILM: Lost Command (15, 1966) Drama with Anthony Quinn 12.25am The Lawless Years (b/w) 12.55 FILM: Murder in Maussane (15, TVM, 2017) 2.55-4.25 FILM: The Devil’s Hand (PG, 1961) (b/w)
ITV4
6.00am The Best of the 80s 6.15
Magnum, PI 8.20 Dempsey and
Makepeace (AD) 9.25 Boon 10.30
The Champions 11.35 Robin of
Sherwood 12.45pm Magnum, PI
2.50 Dempsey and Makepeace (AD)
3.50 Boon 4.55 The Champions
6.00 Formula E. Full deferred
coverage of the Tokyo ePrix race
two at the Tokyo Street Circuit
8.35 The Motorbike Show.
Henry Cole enters the Vintage Motor
Cycle Club’s Banbury Run
9.35 FILM: Time Bandits (PG, 1981)
Fantasy comedy starring Craig
Warnock and David Rappaport
11.50 Star Trek: Strange New
Worlds. The crew encounter
a deadly space pirate (AD)
12.50am Lost (r) 1.40-2.30
Motorsport UK 3.30am-4.00
Motorsport Mundial
Sky Docs
6.00am The Nineties (r) 7.00
Discovering: Denzel Washington (r)
(AD) 8.00 The Directors (r) (AD)
9.00 Ren Faire (r) (AD) 10.00 The
Man Who Played with Fire (r) 11.00
Murder in Boston: Roots, Rampage
and Reckoning (r) 12.00 FILM: Dave
Not Coming Back (PG, 2020)
2.00pm SIC: Prince of MotoGP
(r) 3.40 My Icon: Tanni Grey
Thompson (Pt1) (r) (AD) 4.00 The
Directors (r) (AD) 5.00 Discovering:
Denzel Washington (r) (AD)
6.00 FILM: I Am Jackie O (12,
2020) Documentary profile of
Jackie Kennedy Onassis (AD)
7.45 My Icon: Denise Lewis (r) (AD)
8.00 Murder at the Cottage (r) (AD)
11.00 I’m Chevy Chase and You’re
Not (r) (AD) 1.00am Anatomy of
Lies (r) 4.05 The Directors (r)
(AD) 5.00am-6.00 Discovering:
Denzel Washington (r) (AD)
in London during the Blitz. To nine-year-old Bill (Sebastian Rice- Edwards) the bomb craters are a playground. Even his sister (Sammi Davis) is given to exclaiming, “Come and see the fireworks!” during an air raid. With its nostalgic tone, this was some way from Boorman’s earlier films, yet it finds room for magic realism, such as when a barrage balloon breaks free over the roofs. Boorman earned Oscar nods for directing and screenplay, the film a best picture nomination. (108min) James Jackson
11.00am The Yellow Mountain (PG,
1954) Western starring Howard Duff
12.35pm The Call of the Wild (PG,
2020) Historical adventure starring
Harrison Ford (AD) 2.30 The 300
Spartans (PG, 1962) Historical
drama starring Richard Egan
4.45 Prince Valiant (U, 1954)
Adventure starring Robert Wagner
6.45 Independence Day:
Resurgence (12, 2016) Sci-fi
adventure starring Jeff Goldblum
and Liam Hemsworth (AD)
9.00 No Hard Feelings (15, 2023)
A desperate woman agrees to date
a wealthy couple’s awkward son to
force him out of his shell. Comedy
starring Jennifer Lawrence (AD)
11.05 Passing (12, 2021)
Historical drama starring Tessa
Thompson and Ruth Negga (b/w)
1.05am-3.20 Raging Grace (15,
2023) Horror with Max Eigenmann
6.00am Teleshopping 7.20 The Bill 8.15 Doctors 9.25 Classic Holby City 10.40 Casualty (AD) 11.40 The Bill 12.45pm Classic EastEnders 2.00 Neighbours 3.00 Pie in the Sky 4.00 Lovejoy 5.20 Waiting for God 6.00 Last of the Summer Wine 6.40 Last of the Summer Wine 7.20 Last of the Summer Wine 8.00 The Brokenwood Mysteries. Shepherd encounters a Santa Claus with a slit throat (4/4) (AD) 10.00 New Tricks. A 1971 disappearance is reopened following the discovery of bloodstained clothing (6/7) (AD) 11.00 Silent Witness. A severed finger is brought to the Lyell Centre by an immigration oƾcer (AD) 1.30am Lovejoy 2.35 Waiting for God 3.05 Darby and Joan (SL) 4.00am-6.00 Teleshopping
6.10am Abandoned Engineering
(AD) 8.00 Bangers & Cash (AD)
10.00 Secret Nazi Bases 11.00
World War Two from Above 12.00
Antiques Roadshow 2.00pm
Bangers & Cash: Restoring Classics
(AD) 4.00 Secret Nazi Bases 5.00
World War Two from Above
6.00 Antiques Roadshow
7.00 Asia. The mountains (AD)
8.00 1066: A Year to Conquer
England. Duke William leads his
invasion ƽeet across the Channel
9.00 Portillo’s Empire Journey.
Michael Portillo visits Jamaica (2/4)
10.00 Bangers & Cash: Restoring
Classics. A Series 1 Land Rover (AD)
11.00 Bangers & Cash: Restoring
Classics. A 1981 Silver Spirit (AD)
12.00 Bangers & Cash (AD) 1.00am
Find It, Fix It, Flog It (AD) 2.00
Great British Railway Journeys
3.00am-6.10 Teleshopping
S
A
E
A
I
G
E
G
L
L
Y
A
S M
D
A
I
General Knowledge Crossword No 348
E D
C
R
R
1 2 3 4 5 8 7 6
9 10
11 12
14 15 16
18 19
21 22
24 25 26
27 28
Across 1 African country in which the
A N
C A
ancient sites of Cyrene and Leptis Magna are located (5) 4 Artificial device used to
L O
E L
T O
P
regulate cardiac rhythm (9) 9 Moules ---, classic French
seafood dish (9) 10 Track athletics team event (5) 11 Official name of Saigon in
Vietnam since 1976 (2,3,4,4) 14 Biblical location of a
B
miraculous wedding feast (4) 15 Port situated between
Middlesbrough and Sunderland (10) 18 Poetic line of four feet (10) 19 Film format for cinemas built
with extra-large screens (4) 21 Newly appointed judge on
The Great British Bake Off (7,6) 24 Eldest of the Marx Brothers (5) 25 County whose towns include
Bracknell and Newbury (9)
Last week’s solution
, 6 2 % $ 7 + 6 : + & ( 8 5 $ / $ 1 % $ / / 7 $ 5 1 , 0 5 , $ 6 6 + $ 5 2 1 + 2 5 * $ 1 & ( 6 9 2 , * 0 $ * 1 8 6 $ / / 6 3 , & ( 3 % , 5 9 5 ) ( / 8 & & $ 6 7 5 $ 8 6 6 $ 5 & 2 1 $ & + , 1 $ 7 ( $ 5 2 : , 1 * ( ( 2 % 7 , 6 & + $ 5 / , ( % 5 2 : 1 . $ 5 % $ , . ( 5 1 5 $ 0 3 / , 1 * 6 / , ' 6 1 ( / ( 0 ( 1 7 6
KenKen Easy No 6895
using the
27 Duran Duran No 1 that asked:
“Why don’t you use it?” (3,6) 28 --- Major, constellation
containing the Dog Star (5)
Down 1 Type of white blood cell (10) 2 Unit of pressure equal to
100,000 pascals (3) 3 Epic poem by Virgil (6) 4 All parts of a sentence other
than the subject (9) 5 Language from which “robot”
B J
and “polka” derive (5) 6 Bob ---, comic author of
The Satsuma Complex (8) 7 British gold medallist in the
women’s 800m and 1500m at the 2004 Olympics (5,6) 8 London-born singer of
the 2025 hit Where Is My Husband! (4) 12 First Roman emperor to
adopt Christianity (11) 13 Edible wild plant of the
parsley family (10) 16 1999 sci-fi film starring
S L
Keanu Reeves as Neo (3,6) 17 Swamp-forming tropical
plant with aerial roots (8) 20 Unit roughly equal to three
and a quarter light years (6) 22 Publication of defamatory
material (5) 23 James Watt or John Logie
Baird, eg (4) 26 --- Hislop, satirist and editor of
the magazine Private Eye (3)
Codeword No 5903
Every letter in this crossword-style grid is represented by a number from 1 to 26.
Each letter of the alphabet appears in the grid at least once. Use the letters already
provided to work out the identity of further letters. Enter letters in the main grid
and the smaller reference grid until all 26 letters of the alphabet have been
accounted for. Proper nouns are excluded. Saturday’s solution, right
Cluelines Stuck on Codeword? To receive 4 random clues call 0901 293 6262 or text
TIMECODE to 64343. Calls cost £1 plus your telephone company’s network access
charge. Texts cost £1 plus your standard network charge. For the full solution call
0905 757 0142. If you have an old newspaper and need clues from the past 7 days,
call 0905 624 0024. Calls to 0905 cost £1 per minute plus your telephone company’s
network access charge. SP: Spoke, 0333 202 3390 (Mon-Fri, 9am-5.30pm).
Lexica Easy No 9017 Hard No 9018
W T
Slide the letters either horizontally or vertically back into the grid to produce a
completed crossword. Letters are allowed to slide over other letters
Futoshiki No 5443
The numbers
only. The
X L
Kakuro No 4402
Train Tracks No 2928
© PUZZLER MEDIA
Quintagram® No 2630
Solve all five cryptic clues using each
letter underneath once only
1 Her partner’s late wife repeated
binding marriage vow (5)
2 Might internee start to exhibit
resistance? (5)
3 Keen to eat half of either fruit (6)
4 Flippant heroine traps dangerous
animal (7)
5 Musical work transformed into
work for theatre (9)
A A C D E E E E
H H I I N N O O
O O P P P R R R
R R T T W W W Y
Lay tracks to
enable the
train to travel
from village A
to village B.
indicate how
many
sections of
track go in
each row and
column. There
are only
straight
sections and
curved
sections. The
track cannot
cross itself.
your mind with puzzle books from The Times
timesbookshop.co.uk
Black to play. This position is from Zhao-Pranav, Hong Kong 2026.
The black king is stuck in the centre, which is traditionally regarded as a “bad thing”. Kings usually feel happier when safely tucked away on the kingside or queenside. White’s is on the kingside but is far from safe. Why?
Fill the grid
numbers 1 to 9
numbers in each
horizontal or
vertical run of
white squares
white squares.
add up to the
total in the
triangle to its left
or above it. The
same number
may occur more
than once in a
row or column,
but not within
the same run of
15 MindGames
No 10,219 Brain Trainer
Brain
Trainer
2 3 4 5 6 7
9
11
14 15
18 19
22 23
1 Current, very recent (2,2,3,6)
8 Pompous chatterbox (7)
9 Gradually lost colour (5)
10 Wheat seedhead (3)
11 Arboreal rodent (8)
13 Treat without dignity (6)
14 Palm fibre (6)
17 Literary governess (4,4)
S T
F R I E N D S E N O L N A U S I M U L C A S T M E N O A E G E E B M A S H P O R R I D G E S B N I A C H E E R S B O T T O M U O F R E R E D D W A R F T A X I A A N E I C M T A N O W N E R S H I P E C W Z I E L S H E L L E Y S O R R Y
bottom.
A S
Need help with today’s puzzle? Call 0905 757 0143 to check the answers.
Calls cost £1 per minute plus your telephone company’s network access
charge. SP: Spoke, 0333 202 3390 (Mon-Fri 9am-5.30pm).
Andrew Robson
57th European Bridge National Teams Championships recently concluded in Riga, Latvia. I’ll cut to the chase — England won the Women’s series. This fabulous achievement was made even more so because both members of one of the three pairs, Charlotte Bedford and Lucy Norman, are in their teens. And by no means were they the “third pair” — indeed they spearheaded the team towards the end. Needing a big win in the final match v Israel, Bedford-Norman, with the ever-dependable (OK, more than that, brilliant) Nicola Smith-Nevena Senior at the other table, secured three back-to-back double-figure IMP swings. On the first, Bedford-Norman bid and made 6♥ with these hands.
On a diamond lead, declarer (West) wins and plays ace of spades-queen of spades to discard her diamond (succeeding as South holds the king). This is necessary as North holds the king of hearts. In practice, North led her single-
♥AQ108743 ♦95 ♣AJ10
♥J5 ♦A1063 ♣KQ84
N W E S
N W E S
Pass 2♥ Pass 2NT
Pass 3♥ Pass 4♣(2)
Pass 4♦(3) Pass 4NT(4)
Pass 5♠(5) Pass 6♥ End
(1) Two-over-One forcing to game. (2) Control bid (first or second round con- trol) agreeing hearts. (3) Last train (buck-pass). (4) Roman Key Card Blackwood. (5) Two of “five aces” (incl ♥K); plus ♥Q.
21 Great throng of people (5)
22 In a fortunate manner (7)
24 Still not settled with little
1 Cumbersome, awkward (8)
2 Fit of temper (7)
3 Flap (3)
4 Small item of crockery (6)
5 Enrage (9)
6 Excessive, needless (5)
7 (Of a current) swirl (4)
11 Declaration (9)
12 Grotesque waterspout (8)
15 Italian film director
16 Shoelace hole (6)
18 Archery projectile (5)
20 Outdoor storage hut (4)
23 Signal serving as
culties, her losing diamond going on dummy’s fourth club. This was the next board.
Every single declarer made 4♠ — picking up spades via a low one to the jack then the ace, felling East’s king. That is, except one — v Bedford-Norman. Bedford led a false-card nine of spades, inducing declarer to try to pin her ♠97 dou- bleton holding, covering with dummy’s queen to lose an unnec- essary spade trick. On the third board, you hold ♠10, ♥AQJ873, ♦KQJ10, ♣108 and hear the bidding go 1♠-2♥ (you)-3♠ (pre-emptive)-Pass-Pass back to you (vulnerable v not). The Israeli player passed; 3♠ went three down for +150. Senior backed in with a second-round take-out double, and went +620 when Smith bid 4♥. andrew.robson@thetimes.co.uk
♠Q83 ♥KQ8 ♦KJ106 ♣K32
♥AJ93 ♦532 ♣A74
♥1065 ♦Q874 ♣J1065
♥742 ♦A9 ♣Q98
1♠ Pass 1NT Pass
2♣(2) Pass 3♠(3) Pass
4♠ End
(1) Playing Strong Notrump and short club. (2) Checkback Stayman. (3) Maximum with three spades.
4 1/ OF IT
40 + 24 ÷ 4 x 2 – 30 x 7 – 22 SQUARE
x 6 ÷ 3 ÷ 4 x 5 + 23 – 42 3 1/ OF IT
67% OF IT – 27 TIMES ITSELF ÷ 8 5/19 OF IT
Set Square No 4405
Killer Gentle No 10,844
Tricky No 10,845
As with standard Sudoku, fill the grid so that every column,
the grid, so that
every row and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 to 9. Each set
of cells joined by dotted lines must add up to the target number
in its top-left corner. Within each set of cells joined by dotted
1/ OF IT + – 131
OF IT – 155
From these letters, make words of
three or more letters, always including
the central letter. Answers must be in
the Concise Oxford Dictionary, excluding
Concise
capitalised words, plurals, conjugated
verbs (past tense etc), adverbs ending
in LY, comparatives and superlatives.
How you rate 12 words, average;
16, good; 20, very good; 25, excellent
Saturday’s answers
acuity, ascitic, attic, autist, autistic,
cactus, cast, catsuit, catty, caustic,
causticity, cist, city, cutis, cutty, cyst,
cystic, ictus, sati, scat, scatty, sciatic,
scut, stat, static, stay, suit, sutta, tacit,
tact, tactic, tasty, taut, titi
Quick Cryptic 3362
Cryptic
Tredoku 1952
Square Routes
Sudoku 16,976
Killer 10,843
No 5786
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© PUZZLER MEDIA
Please note, BODMAS does not apply
Codeword 5902
U Y A L A F E T O N U R N G C H C A E H
Lexica 9011 Set Square 4403
Futoshiki 5441
KenKen 6894
Quintagram
Quintagram
2 Rhine 3 White 4 Sparkling 5 Fortified
2 Power 3 Cherry 4 Panther 5 Operation
Word watch
for wine (OED) Spinto (a) A lyrical singing voice (Collins) Purdonium (b) A kind of coal scuttle (Chambers)
Chess — Winning Move
conclusion as 2 gxf4 g3 is mate.
Divide the grid
into square or
rectangular
blocks, each
containing one
digit only. Every
block must
contain the
number of cells
indicated by the
digit inside it.
Enter each of
the numbers
from 1 to 9 in
the six sums
work. We’ve
placed two
numbers to get
you started.
Each sum
should be
calculated left
to right or top to
Kakuro 4400
Train Tracks 2927
B E R T H
U T U
R E F U N D
Y U
F L O W
Lexica 9012
O D E V
O B O A
V I A C
E L E A
S E W A G E
Sakuro 4804
Medium 51 Harder 54
Quiz
4 The Hay Wain 5 Ships 6 Annie Oakley 7 Kate 8 Kiln 9 Catatonia 10 Leon Trotsky 11 Sweetpea 12 Lisp 13 Mizoram 14 Mike Gatting 15 Bernard Levin
Sudoku Easy No 16,977 Difficult No 16,978 Fiendish No 16,979 Word watch
David Parfitt
Aam a An angular volcanic rock b A unit of capacity for wine c A reverential bow
Spinto a A lyrical singing voice b A horse with white patches c A betting game
Purdonium a A state of isolation or concealment b A kind of coal scuttle c A form of theatre stage
The Times Daily Quiz Olav Bjortomt
1 Restaurant Gordon Ramsay in Chelsea is celebrating 25 years of holding how many Michelin stars?
2 Smirnoff North liqueur combines the flavour of Nordic berries with which spirit?
3 Which city in the US state of Georgia is nicknamed “ATL”?
4 A 1980 artwork by Peter Kennard places cruise missiles in which landscape painting by John Constable?
5 Marcus Garvey’s Black Star Line operated which mode of transport?
6 In 1887, which American sharpshooter was called a “very clever
The Times Quick Cryptic No 3364 by Trelawney
Fill the grid so that every column, every row and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 to 9.
little girl” by Queen Victoria?
7 What first name links female writers named Atkinson, Chopin, Mosse, Quinn and Morton?
8 Porcelain is made by heating raw materials in which type of
ALAMY
11 Which 2017 serial killer novel by CJ Skuse was adapted into a 2024 Sky Atlantic TV series?
12 Created by Rich Hickey, Clojure is a dialect of which computer programming language?
13 India’s three Christian-majority states, all in the northeast, are Meghalaya, Nagaland and what?
specialised oven?
14 Which Ashes-winning captain led the English rebel tour to South Africa in 1990?
9 In 1998, which Welsh indie band had hits with Mulder and Scully, Road Rage and Strange Glue?
15 Which columnist for The Times from 1971 to 1997 is pictured?
10 Brian Cox made his film debut playing which Russian revolutionary in Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)?
Across
1
Created autograph in legal
document (8)
5 Mark’s second automobile (4)
8 Dance and drink brown ale,
initially (5) 9 Reprimand aristocrat
suppressing expression of disgust (4,3) 11 Spooner’s sentry arrived for
poker, say (4,4) 12 Layer of earth came down at
last? (3) 14 Returned an awful pink
serviette (6) 16 Bloke reportedly in hot spring
(6) 18 Bird found in lowlands (3) 19 Distribute a large find (8) 22 Friend holding revolutionary
knife (7) 23 Love judge to give speech (5) 24 Ceremony correct by the
Sakuro No 4804
Place the numbers 1 to 9 in the spaces
so that the number in each circle is
equal to the sum of the four surrounding
spaces, and each colour total is correct
For interactive puzzles visit thetimes.com
Down
1
Top of dragon boat is black (4)
2 Nation has a moat, partially (5)
3 Finland rage about impressive
conclusion (5,6)
4 Catch parent dancing (6)
6 Garments from loch set out (7)
7
Greek regularly put on glad
rags for factory (8)
10 Beginning to carry bar shoes
for smart alec (6,5) 13 Whistleblower playing well?
I’m not sure (8) 15 Weaselly individual shredded
lace top (7) 17 Rip off woolly garment (6) 20 Track down tiny amount (5) 21 Tolerate Paddington, for
example (4)
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for more puzzles
• Puzzles updated daily
• Play against the clock
• Compete in our leaderboard
• Play off line and online
To try a digital subscription, visit thetimes.com/subscribe
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结论:存在严重缺陷 (Blocking Issues Found)
该翻译版本在完整性、忠实度以及内容一致性方面存在严重问题。翻译结果不仅出现了大面积的漏译,还混入了与当前源文本完全无关的幻觉内容(Hallucinations)。
£3.2 billion 在部分段落被误译为 £3.20 或 £2.35(见 Page 1 底部)。Monday July 27 2026 在翻译预览的警告部分被列为 missing numeric tokens,但实际上在正文中出现了,显示审计逻辑混乱。[!WARNING]、翻译质量评估未完全通过 以及 Missing proper nouns in translation 等审计日志/清理标签。根据指令,这些内部标签被视为交付缺陷。# 接前页 1 标签。| 类别 | 描述 | 示例 |
|---|---|---|
| 漏译 (Omission) | 丢失完整文章 | AI adoption among smaller businesses... $\rightarrow$ 完全缺失 |
| 幻觉 (Hallucination) | 引入无关外部文本 | "绿党因反对禁止伊朗革命卫队的动议面临抵制" $\rightarrow$ 源文中无此内容 |
| 数值错误 (Wrong Number) | 关键金额错误 | £3.2 billion $\rightarrow$ 误写为 £3.20 |
| 残留标签 (Residual Labels) | 包含 QA 审计日志 | missing numeric tokens from source: 1071... |
审计结论:不合格 (FAILED) 该译文不可用。其最严重的问题在于严重的内容漂移 (Content Drift),将无关的政治新闻替代了原本的经济/科技新闻。建议重新翻译并严格校验文本对齐。